From the August issue: New Yorkers are fleeing the city in the scorching summer heat, trading subway cars for the Hamptons Jitney and business casual for bathing suits. Even so, the residential rental market is as sizzling-hot as the temperature, brokers say.
According to a market report released by the brokerage Citi Habitats, the average second-quarter rent for a Manhattan apartment jumped around 10 percent from the same period of 2010. Taking into consideration landlord concessions like a month of free rent, the median net-effective monthly rent paid by Manhattan tenants grew to $2,888 in the second quarter, up from $2,700 in the prior-year quarter, according to a report from Prudential Douglas Elliman.
“The rental market is going absolutely crazy,” said Bruno Ricciotti, a principal at Bond New York Real Estate. In some desirable neighborhoods, he said, apartments are renting for higher prices than they did during the peak of the real estate boom. [more]

Bond New York’s Michael Chadwick and Devin Grissom, the woman he’ll be vying for on CMT’s “Sweet Home Alabama”

If his online biography is to be believed, Bond New York agent Michael Chadwick is used to attention. “Complete strangers often stop Michael on the streets of NYC, just to let him know he looks like Tom Cruise,” his website reads. “Asians seem to like him a lot, especially Koreans.” (No one ever said modesty was a necessity in New York real estate). So it really shouldn’t come as a surprise that Chadwick, who specializes in apartment rentals in Midtown West and the Upper West Side and also bills himself as a model, actor and musician, is the latest victim of the industry’s reality television bug. According to an announcement from Bond’s press representative, Chadwick is set to star in County Music Television’s new dating reality show, “Sweet Home Alabama,” which premieres Thursday at 9 p.m.

Perhaps unfortunately for Chadwick, the object of his affections on the eight-episode series is not Korean, but rather a bona fide “Southern belle” from Alabama, who’ll be choosing, “Bachelorette”-style, from among 20 men hailing from both the small country towns she’s used to and from the “big city.”
– Sarabeth Sanders [more]

From left: 101 Warren Street, Asher Alcobi of Peter Ashe Real Estate and Michael Chen of Bond New York (top), Wei Min Tan of Castle Avenue Partners (bottom), Trump Soho, and 250 East 53rd Street

Now added to the long list of exports from China are buyers of New York City real
estate.

Chinese residents flush with cash from the Asian nation’s booming economy, and in
some cases limited in what they can buy at home, are starting to look at Manhattan
apartments.

Between March 2010 and March 2011, 9 percent of foreign buyers in the U.S. were from
China, according to the National Association of Realtors, up from 5 percent in 2007.
Canada sends the U.S. the most foreign buyers, with 23 percent, but China is number
two, the data shows. In contrast, England, Mexico and India, next on the list, each
represent 7 percent.

And many of those Chinese buyers are trickling into New York, say brokers, who are
creating customized services to greet them. [more]

From the June issue: In past years, many New Yorkers depended on the searchable classified ad service Craigslist.org to help them find affordable apartments, often without brokers’ fees. But these days, many are trading hours of scrolling through apartments on Craigslist for posting housing queries in the form of status updates on Facebook or Twitter.
For the consumer, social media is a way of avoiding the possibility that what’s advertised on Craigslist may not really be what’s available. For the broker, it’s a new opportunity for marketing.
[more]

Manhattan-based real estate brokerage BP Vance will no longer rent and sell apartments to and for individuals, founder and attorney Adam Leitman Bailey told The Real Deal today. The company will exclusively focus on brokering deals for its existing corporate client base, starting next month.

This change in focus is about playing to the company’s big income clients and comes as a result of the demand for experts to navigate pre-foreclosures and other distressed property opportunities, according to Bailey, who started the company in 1997, naming it after his grandparents Bob and Paula Vance. “It’s a matter of math,” Bailey said. “If you’re making a lot of money one way, you may as well stick to that formula.” [more]

Bruno Ricciotti (l) and Noah Freedman, founders of Bond New York

From the May issue: This year, for the first time, scrappy upstarts ousted 138-year-old Brown Harris Stevens from its longtime berth among the city’s five largest firms. Since The Real Deal began its annual ranking of Manhattan residential firms in 2004, the same four sales firms — Prudential Douglas Elliman, the Corcoran Group, Brown Harris Stevens and Halstead Property — have dominated the top of the list. For years, these companies have reigned supreme as the largest firms in the city, with the most agents, the most listings and often the most exposure. [more]

From the May issue: The first-quarter market reports released last month by the city’s major residential firms yielded few shockers. With sales volume largely unchanged from last year, industry experts agreed that the market is generally stable.

But the data did bring one unexpected twist: an unusual spike in the number of co-ops sold.

The first quarter saw “an unusually high” number of co-op transactions versus condos, said Jonathan Miller, CEO of Miller Samuel and the preparer of Prudential Douglas Elliman’s market report.

“Co-ops are seeing a burst of activity, and condos are seeing a sharp drop,” Miller said.

Elliman’s report found 1,430 closed sales of co-ops in the first quarter, surging 28.7 percent from 1,111 in the same period of last year. Condo sales, meanwhile, dropped 24.3 percent to 964 from 1,273 in the prior-year quarter. [more]

Brokerage Bond New York scheduled to offer a deal on online coupon site Groupon today that would charge consumers $25 for $1,000 off closing costs in the sale or purchase of their next home. However, Noah Freedman, co-founder of Bond, was notified over the weekend that the deal would have to be pulled due to legal reasons, according to Crain’s, though the exact reasons weren’t immediately available.

This comes a month after Chicago real estate brokerage Dream Town Realty became the first real estate firm to use Groupon to attract new clients. [more]

Stuart Elliott

From the May issue: The Real Deal is firing up the klieg lights and rolling out the red carpet.
This month will see the premiere of our first full-length documentary feature film. Called “Building Stories,” it’s a look at the most prolific architect in New York City, Costas Kondylis, who has added an incredible 86 towers to the skyline here but is a relative unknown to the average man on the street.
The film, which features interviews with real estate bigwigs like Donald Trump, Larry Silverstein, Richard Meier, Aby Rosen and many others, will be screened as part of an invite-only event May 11 at the Morgan Library in Midtown. Later this month, check out our website for more information about the film’s public release date. [more]

Clockwise from top left: photographer Markus Klinko and the apartment he resided in at 508 Laguardia Place, and two images of Chinese painter Li-lan’s East Hampton home

A Greenwich Village penthouse now available for rent has a history of artistic residents. The 4,500-square-foot triplex at 508 Laguardia Place — currently asking $26,000 per month — was for years the home of famed fashion photographer Markus Klinko, currently co-star of the Bravo reality show “Double Exposure.” The home has four bedrooms and four-and-a-half bathrooms, and is listed with Bond New York’s Janine Young. Klinko now lives at 515 East 72nd Street, where the first season of “Double Exposure” was filmed. But he lived and worked at 508 Laguardia Place for about seven years while he was making his name as a photographer, the building’s owner, Josh Weiss, said. During that time, it was common to see stars like Jennifer Lopez entering the converted factory, located between Bleecker and West Houston streets, to be photographed by Klinko, Weiss said. Click here for more.

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