When you strip away the context, sure, this apartment is—as a commeter said—"a walk-up one bedroom with no closet space, basically." But this is the classy Upper East Side, between Fifth and Mad, meaning the walk-up is in a townhouse, bearskin litters the floor, chairs get firmly planted in front of fireplaces and that den is a bedroom because they say so. To all those who guessed under $2 million, what, you thought they'd price it as a 1BR? Heck no, or as our anonymous correct guesser put it, "Not a one bedroom, not a two bedroom. A one-and-a-half bedroom. $1.2MM for a 1 bed room, $3.1MM for a two bedroom. So $2.15MM for a one-and-a-half bedroom." Can't argue with that logic.
· Listing: Exquisite Townhouse Residence [Sotheby's]
· Curbed PriceSpotter: Zip it, Upper East Side! [Curbed]
In cities and towns across this great land, teachers are instructing their young pupils to write letters to the president as a lesson in citizenship and democracy. On Roosevelt Island, a place with no government or laws, kids write letters to a different president—the one in charge of something called the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation—and instead of wishing for world peace or asking what Santa Claus is like, they just beg to not contract tetanus.
· Roosevelt Island Community Activists Start Young - Will They Be Heard? [Roosevelt Islander]
PriceSpotter is Curbed's asking price guessing game. We provide you with some details and pictures from an apartment listing, and you take a crack at the price in the comments. Tomorrow we reveal the answer. And hey, no cheating!
What/Where: 2BR, 1.5BA co-op on 64th Street btwn Fifth/Madison Square Feet: not listed Maintenance: $3,033 The Skinny: As we near the one-year anniversary of the split of the Upper East Side's prestigious 10021 zip code into three smaller zips, the Post reports that the southern region of the shattered empire, the new 10065, has surpassed 10021 in average real estate sales price—despite missing many of Park and Fifth Avenues' toniest co-ops. To celebrate the crowning of 10065 as the new king of the UES, let's have a look at a new listing in the 'hood. This top-floor townhouse apartment is on the small side for the storied UES, but hey, we're talking about entry into the 10065 here! It has central A/C, two wood-burning fireplaces, a Juliette balcony that overlooks some gardens and a small guest bedroom/library. It also has a dead animal lying on the floor. So, how much?
· Curbed PriceSpotter archives [Curbed]
When Lord Norman Foster, an architect so important that his driver's license also reads Baron Foster of Thames Bank, tried to pull a Hearst on the Parke-Bernet Gallery at 980 Madison Avenue—inserting a glassy new tower into a drab existing building—the locals threw a hissy fit so fierce that the plan was shelved. The Upper East Side generation gap that caused the disconnect would seem insurmountable, but Foster and developer Aby Rosen are back for round two, and Nicolai Ouroussoff has the reveal of the proposed new 980 Madison Avenue today. Like the previous design, it's a new building stuck into an existing structure, but this one is low and lazy. It's hard to get a feel from the one little rendering, so we go to The Ouroussoff:
Clad in elegant bronze bands, its low blocky form would rest directly on the existing structure, echoing its exact proportions. More important, perhaps, it would be far less visible from the multimillion-dollar penthouse apartments just across the street.
Via the CurbedWire: "According to the 'Celebrity Real Estate Wrap: Santana Throws UES Curveball' story, the squash court is the new must have amenity. Any thoughts on why? I mean obviously you would attract the 'right kind' of buyer/tenant but will this be a tactic that more and more developers will begin to use.? It’s low cost in that it just requires the square footage some wood and some lights but what are these guys thinking? I know of one building with a private squash court (Starck’s on Broad and Wall) and you have a story on another. Will we see more of this?" [CurbedWire Inbox]
1) The trend of Heal Estate—the conversion of churches and synagogues into residential and commercial developments—has claimed two dozen houses of worship in Manhattan and Brooklyn since the '80s, according to this report. The latest is the Sanctuary in Fort Greene (above), which, it turns out, is not a hoax. Here's the enlightened website. [Posting/C.J. Hughes]
2) In this real estate market of ours, where glorified storage lockers sell for $800,000, one of the few places to find a deal is on the top floor of a walk-up: "While the average price last year for a first-floor unit in a walk-up was $680,940, the average price for one on the fifth floor was only $515,723, a discount of around 24 percent." If there's no outdoor space, the price is even lower. Start working those calf muscles! ['Worth the Climb'/Vivian S. Toy]
3) It wasn't long ago when the residents of Ridgewood entered into a love/hate relationship with the incoming waves of hipster gentrification. Now that the process is complete, here comes the next wave of pilgrims: well-to-do yuppie parents. [Habitats/Stephen P. Williams]
We're a day late on revealing the listing for this week's PriceSpotter, but c'mon people—the freaking Hudson Yards fell apart! Anyhowsers, we knew the location and outright luxuryosity of this new condo pretty much made it a giveaway, but most people were good about not looking it up. A lot of the guesses were in the $2-$2.5 range, and the first correct answer (but was it clean?) was a guest named Mike at #7. This condo closed less than two months ago for $1.7 million. Aggressive!
· Listing: 170 East End Avenue [Olshan Realty]
· Curbed PriceSpotter: Early Action on East End [Curbed]
PriceSpotter is Curbed's asking price guessing game. We provide you with some details and pictures from an apartment listing, and you take a crack at the price in the comments. Tomorrow we reveal the answer. And hey, no cheating!
What/Where: 2BR, 2.5BA condo on East End Avenue btwn 87th/88th Square Feet: 1,651 Maintenance & Taxes: $1,708 The Skinny: This apartment is one of the first resales in this building, which probably gives it away, but it's an interesting twist we felt shouldn't go unmentioned. So back off on looking it up and just concentrate on the bells and whistles: full-service luxury doorman building with high-end fixtures, washer/dryer, 10' ceilings, entry gallery, etc. No East River views from this puppy, but you do catch a look at the building's private landscaped garden. And just a water balloon toss from Gracie Mansion, too, so that's a plus. So, how much for this flip job?
· Curbed PriceSpotter archives [Curbed]
The weirdest deal on the Gold Coast this year is the one reported today by the Observer's Max Abelson at 926 Fifth Avenue. The massive 12,000sqft townhouse has been an on-and-off infuriating obsession over time, because here's the deal: the listing, which has fluctuated in price from $23.8 million down to $14.5 million, is actually just to take over the long-term lease. In 2038, the Upper East Side mansion will return to the estate of its European owners (the house was briefly listed for sale for $45 million). Who in their right mind would throw away eight figures in what is basically key money, and then pay $37,500 per month in rent to the owners? The answer is James Tisch, the CEO of the Loews Corporation, who paid $21 million to do just that earlier this year. Never mind that the current Stribling listing showed a $14.5 million asking price, and this scheme has been treading water on the market for three years. 926 Fifth Avenue, my how you confound us!
· Hot Tisch! James Pays $21 M. for Lease on Fifth Avenue Mansion [NYO]
· Listing: 926 Fifth Avenue [Stribling]
· 926 Fifth Ave. Begins Downward Spiral [Curbed]
The Kentucky Derby may have been run over the weekend, but the real race is just getting underway. Once the jockey was selected we knew it was just a matter of time, and now the starting gun has fired and the gates have flung open (ctrl + alt + endmetaphor). Late grand dame Brooke Astor's legendary 778 Park Avenue duplex has hit the market at a $46 million asking price. Corcoran's Leighton Candler has the task of selling the 5BR, 5.5BA apartment on Floors 15-16, which is just above the full-floor spread recently purchased by rich guy William Lauder for $27.5 million. Surprisingly, the listing has several photos and complete floorplan pornage, and the apartment looks exactly like what you'd expect a classic Park Avenue duplex owned by a 4,000-year-old socialite to look like. We wouldn't pay a dime over $38.5 million, but that's just us.
· Listing: 778 Park Avenue [Corcoran]
· 778 Park Avenue coverage [Curbed]
1) Since buying it for just over $31 million in 2005, Len Blavatnik—no stranger to megadeals both rumored and real—has let the 75-foot-wide mansion at 2 East 63rd Street (right) sit empty and become decrepit. A far cry from the "Roman villa" it used to be. [Streetscapes/Christopher Gray]
2) The strangest part of this tale of how a pair of models came to settle in Greenpoint is that they left Williamsburg because it "had already become saturated with want-to-be artists, and sort of a fashion parade on Bedford Street." That's right, models think the Bedford (Avenue, by the way) fashion scene is ridiculous. [Habitats/Celia Barbour]
3) Maspeth, Queens, long a Curbed staff pick for a neighborhood that will eventually be overrun by development, is proud of its status as a "double ticket" community, meaning it's a bus ride to a subway ride to Manhattan. But be afraid, Maspethians, because after Bushwick and Ridgewood, you're next. [Living In/Gregory Beyer]
4) A look into the life of retail broker queen Faith Hope Consolo reveals that the bank boom may be over, drug stores are the new banks and Danny Meyer may be eying Harlem. Though that may just be a little buzz-building on the FHC's part. [The City]
5) A young couple has their sights set on a starter home in Westchester, so what in God's name brings them to a new construction condo in Jersey City? Surely it's not the $30,000 parking spots. [The Hunt/Joyce Cohen]
6) Stories like this have been everywhere lately, but for some reason, reading about how Grand Theft Auto's Liberty City compares to the real New York never gets old. We hear the Dukes waterfront is going to be huge! [The City]
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1) Since buying it for just over $31 million in 2005, Len Blavatnik—no stranger to 
