Report: Mets owners give up Hauppauge property

The Wall Street Journal reports today that Woodlands Office Park, a commercial buildlng in Hauppauge co-owned by Fred Wilpon of the Mets, is set to be handed over to the mortgage holder to avert foreclosure.

"The real-estate investment management business controlled by besieged Mets owners Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz is giving up a struggling Long Island office-building complex to its creditors, according to a person familiar with the matter," the Journal said.

"Facing a foreclosure, a venture led by Sterling American Property Inc. is set to hand the keys of Woodlands Office Park, a 127,000-square-foot complex bought near the top of the market, to its mortgage holder," the person said.

The Wilpon family is under pressure as they face a lawsuit from investors who lost money in the Bernard Madoff financial fraud, amid allegations that the Wilpons knew, or should have known, that their Madoff investment profits were derived from a Ponzi scheme.

Photo: Jeff and Fred Wilpon, Mets owners