The Goldman Family Feud: A Billionaire Aunt, Her Ambitious Nephew, and a 40-Year Real-Estate Dynasty at War

Jane Goldman — the only female billionaire in the U.S. running a real-estate business, per Forbes — sits atop one of New York City's most quietly powerful property empires, a collection of ground leases beneath landmarks like the Cartier Building on Fifth Avenue and the Gramercy Park Hotel. The company, Solil, was built by her father Sol Goldman, a Brooklyn grocer's son who once amassed 1,900 properties including a stake in the Chrysler Building, and who reportedly once demanded $20 million for a building worth a fraction of that — and got it. When Sol died in 1987, he left the business to Jane and her brother Allan, with their sisters Diane and Amy holding equal stakes. Much of this structure was informal, undocumented, and built on family trust — a setup that would eventually prove explosive.

The current battle pits Jane, now in her late 60s, against her nephew Steven Gurney-Goldman, Allan's only son, who joined the family firm in 2013 after graduating from Vanderbilt. Their differences ran deep from the start: Jane ran the business conservatively — no debt, no development, just rent collection — while Steven, who had won nearly $30,000 in a competitive poker tournament in 2015, wanted to buy and build. Jane says he accomplished nothing of note during his tenure; Steven's camp credits him with implementing online rent payment, clearing thousands of housing violations, and getting his father removed from a citywide worst-landlord list.

The family's already strained dynamics collapsed completely after Steven's father Allan died in January 2022, alone in Saint Petersburg's City Hospital No. 40, after being brought to Russia by his longtime companion Natalia Vostrikova for experimental stem-cell therapy. Allan was 78, could not stand, walk, or feed himself, and had been battling Parkinson's. Jane used luxury travel contacts and connections to Moscow's chief rabbi to repatriate the body; Allan's funeral was held at Temple Emanu-El on the Upper East Side. But the grief quickly curdled into accusations: Jane blamed Steven for neglecting his father while serving as his healthcare proxy; Steven sued Vostrikova, alleging foul play, though the two eventually settled.

The conflict then escalated into an outright legal war over the family business. At the center of it is a jaw-dropping alleged confrontation: Steven, during an in-person visit to Jane's Midtown Manhattan office, allegedly told her he would share damaging information with her older sister Amy — with whom Jane was already in litigation over property valuations — unless Jane gave him a 25% stake in the business. Jane, who compared her nephew to a poker player bluffing a hand, refused. Steven called the blackmail allegation ridiculous, testifying he had raised concerns about an improperly conducted appraisal that he believed Jane had manipulated to reduce its value. The dispute played out in a Delaware courtroom in 2024, with both aunt and nephew testifying on the same day — and then walking out of the courthouse in cold silence when Jane called for a family photo.

At its core, the Goldman saga is a collision of clashing personalities, generational ambition, and the structural chaos that comes from running a multibillion-dollar empire on handshakes and family trust. Jane, who learned the business by spending every day with Sol Goldman from her 20s onward — dinners every night, weekends included — runs the company the way her father did: squeeze tenants, hold the land, don't sell. Developers who've dealt with her, like Extell's Gary Barnett, say she routinely extracts more than they planned to pay, operating from a position of studied indifference. Steven, meanwhile, represents the next generation's desire for a different kind of empire — one that builds, not just collects. Whether he gets a seat at the table or is frozen out entirely may ultimately be decided in court.