Rubin Schron

Rubin Schron, who goes by Ruby, is a New York City real estate investor, landlord and the founder of Cammeby's International Group. He owns or controls property worth over $900 million, according to data company Real Capital Analytics. The portfolio of Cammeby's, which Schron founded in 1967, includes office buildings, market-rate and government-subsidized apartment complexes, nursing homes, the 16-building complex in Sunset Park now known as Industry City, a stake in the bottom half of Woolworth Building and industrial properties scattered across Long Island. In 2013, Schron made an unsolicited and unsuccessful offer to buy the Empire State Building for $2 billion, but he has not had problems closing many other deals throughout his long career. In 2003, an investment group led by Schron paid $705.6 million for a portfolio of about 6,000 outer-borough apartments from Donald Trump. Other buildings he owns include the Monterey, a 521-unit rental multifamily building on Manhattan's Upper East Side; over the decades, Schron has also amassed a portfolio of Mitchell-Lama apartment buildings whose values have been skyrocketing to record values, after reverting to market rates when government subsidies expired. In 2007, he sold nearly 4,000 units of former Mitchell-Lama properties in five complexes in Harlem and on Roosevelt Island for $940 million. Schron, who practices Orthodox Judaism, has eight children and 50 grandchildren. He and his family have lived in the same single-family home in Brooklyn for many decades.

Schron grew up on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in an Orthodox Jewish family. His family entered the real estate business by using the proceeds from the death of his brother in World War II to purchase a small apartment building.

Schron continued with the family business purchasing several buildings in the Bronx. In 1967, he founded the real estate investment company Cammeby's International Group. Typically partnering in all his transactions, Schron steadily grew the business. In 2007, Cammeby's was managing over $1 billion in assets. Rubin Schron partners with Avrohom Fruchthandler president of FBE Limited on most of his large real estate deals.

Significant transactions include:

• In 1998, he and partner Steve Witkoff purchased the Woolworth Building for $137.5 million.
• In 2003, he purchased 6,000 outer borough apartments from the estate of Fred Trump.
• In 2007, he sold 4,000 Mitchell-Lama apartments for $940 million to Urban American Management and its private equity partner, City Investment Fund.
• In 2011, he sold the Lionel Hampton Houses in Harlem to real estate investor Israel Weinberger for $32.5 million.
• In 2013, he made an unsuccessful bid for the Empire State Building.
• In 2013, he purchased the Monterey, a 521 unit apartment tower, for $250 million from The Related Companies.

Nursing home investments

In 2002, Schron was advised by his friend and attorney, Leonard Grunstein, to purchase two large nursing home chains with over 18,000 patients and 183 facilities spread out over 27 states for a combined $1.4 billion. In 2003, the bankrupt Integrated Health Services (renamed SavaSeniorCare) was purchased and in 2004, Mariner Health Care was purchased. Schron financed the entire transaction.They split each company into two entities: a real estate company which would hold the real property (run by Schron); and an operating company that would run the nursing homes (run by Grunstein and a banker named Murray Foreman). The operating company would make lease payments to the real estate company.

In 2006, whistleblower Adam B. Resnick filed a lawsuit under the False Claims Act against nursing home pharmaceutical supplier Omnicare and Schron's two nursing home chains, Mariner Health Care and SavaSeniorCare alleging that the two nursing home chains solicited kickbacks from Omnicare in exchange for 15-year contracts to utilize Omnicare's pharmacy service. In December 2008, the U.S. Department of Justice joined the lawsuit. In November 2010, Omnicare, denying any wrongdoing, settled by paying $19.8 million to the federal government. In February 2010, Mariner and SavaSeniorCare paid $14 million to settle their part in the alleged fraud.

The partnership deteriorated after Schron was told by Grunstein that he could not raise rent payments even while interest rates were rising.A lawsuit resulted and Schron countersued to exercise a $100 million option to purchase the nursing home side of the business. Schron, represented by attorney Andrew J. Levander, prevailed and in 2012, he took full control of the two nursing home companies with a combined $1.4 billion in revenues.

Schron is widowed having lost his wife Marta in June 2020. They had eight children together. He lives in Brooklyn in the same single-family home where he raised his family. He leads a simple life and eschews interviews.