Joseph Chetrit

Joseph Chetrit
Residence	New York City, U.S.
Occupation	Businessman
Spouse(s)	Nancy Chetrit
Children	4
Parent(s)	Simon Chetrit Alice Chetrit

Joseph Chetrit is an American real estate investor and developer.

Chetrit was born to a Jewish family in Morocco to Simon and Alice Chetrit. He has four brothers: David, Meyer, Jacob and Juda Chetrit. The Chetrit family made their initial fortune in textiles and shipping. In 1996, his father and his brother David were arrested and jailed in Morocco for smuggling and were cited as an example of injustice by the U.S. State Department in their annual human rights report. They were pardoned and released in 1998.

Chetrit arrived in the United States initially tasked with furthering the family's textile business working as an importer/exporter. After pleading guilty to one felony count of violating customs laws in 1990 (and being sentenced to three years’ probation), he turned to real estate assembling a portfolio of outer-borough residential properties which he sold for $70 million in the early 1990s. In 1994, he entered into his first commercial real estate transaction, purchasing an office building on West 44th Street for $13 million. In 2002, he partnered with Brooklyn-based Simon Dushinsky's Rabsky Group to develop a portfolio of properties he purchased out of bankruptcy in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. In 2004, Chetrit was the lead investor in a group that purchased the 110-story Sears Tower in Chicago for $840 million with partners Joseph Moinian, and Israel Gluck, eventually changing the name to the Willis Tower in 2009.

Other purchases include Park West Village on the Upper West Side, the International Toy Center on Madison Square Park, 500 and 512 Seventh Ave. in the Garment District, and the Caledonian Hospital complex in Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

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