Donald Trump

DONALD JOHN TRUMP

Donald John Trump is a real estate developer who became involved in large profitable building projects in mostly Manhattan. In 1980, he opened the Grand Hyatt which enabled him to become the city’s best known and most controversial developer. He pursued several more development projects which made him today a billionaire businessman.

Donald John Trump, a mogul, was born on the 14^th June 1946 in the Queens, New York. He was the fourth of five children. His father, Frederick Trump was a builder and a real estate developer who specialized mostly in the construction and the operation of middle income apartments in the Queens, Staten Island and Brooklyn. Donald Trump was very self-confident and active as a child and this was the reason why his parents decided to send him to the New York Military Academy when he was only 13, hoping that the severity of the school would make the child channel his energy better. Trump was both socially and academically good at the school and actually became a star athlete and a student leader by the time he graduated in 1964. He then enrolled into Fordham University and later transferred to the Wharton School of Finance at the University of Pennsylvania. He graduated from the latter in 1968 with a degree in economics.

Having been influenced by his father, the young Trump decided to make a career in real estate development. However, his goals were higher than those of his father as he had a driving need to succeed in his life. After his graduation from college, Trump joined the company of this father known as the Trump Organization. He succeeded in financing an expansion of the company’s holdings by persuading his father to be more open-minded in the use of loans based on the equity in the Trump apartment complexes. However, the business was extremely competitive and profits were quite slim.

In 1971, Donald Trump decided to move his home to Manhattan where he met many influential people. The businessman was convinced that there was economic opportunity in this city and thus he became involved in large building projects in Manhattan. This would give him the prospect of earning higher profits, utilizing striking architectural designs and gaining public recognition. In 1974, Trump was able to obtain a choice on one of the Penn Central’s hotels, the Commodore, which was unbeneficial but which had an amazing location adjacent to the Grand Central Station. He agreed on a partnership the following year with the Hyatt Hotel Corporation. The intelligent businessman then worked out a complex deal with the city in order to gain a 40 year tax abatement. He then arranged the financing and renovated the building completely by constructing an outstanding façade of reflective glass designed by the architect Der Scutt.

By 1989, Trump was branching out to buy the Eastern Air Shuttle for about $365 million to rename it the Trump Shuttle. In January 1990, the real estate developer went to Los Angeles with the intention of building a $1 million commercial and residential project featuring a 15 story office building. It was however then that the real estate market declined causing Trump’s empire to lose in both value and income. The Trump Organization had to borrom enormous amount of loans to keep the company from collapsing.

However, Donald Trump climbed back from around $900 million; the successful businessman was reported to be worth close to $2 billion in 1997.