Clockwise from top left: Modern Spaces CEO Eric Benaim, an early rendering of the common recreation room, a master bathroom, 44-15 Purves Street (credit: PropertyShark) and an early rendering of the lobby

It’s not for a lack of balconies that residents of a forthcoming Long Island City condominium won’t be able to gaze out on their outdoor space from the comfort of their living rooms. Rather it’s because of an abundance of feng shui.

Tomorrow morning, Vantage Partners will break ground on a 15-story, 48-unit condominium at 44-15 Purves Street in LIC that will benefit from a feng shui consultant. As a result, the groundbreaking ceremony will include the burial of nine red envelopes, with wishes enclosed, underneath the cornerstone. Once complete, the building won’t have a fourth floor (four is to feng shui enthusiasts as 13 is to Americans), units won’t have balconies adjacent to the living room (the developer will build separate entryways) and the entrance to each unit won’t directly face another interior door. [more]

Feng shui, an ancient Chinese art aimed at creating harmonious living environments, is gaining traction among real estate agents faced with finicky buyers and unusual floorplans, according to this video from the Wall Street Journal. Susan Chan, a feng shui expert, said she’s used her expertise to help brokers organize model apartments that are pleasing to the eye. Of course, Chan is hardly the first to use age-old traditions in the modern real estate market. As The Real Deal reported in 2009, feng shui, along with cleansing rituals like “smudging” have grown in popularity among residential brokers.

A Feng Shui chart (click to enlarge)

Feng shui — the Chinese system of beliefs that governs building design, the calendar and numbers, and which is followed by people in other cultures, especially in East Asia — is playing more of a role in real estate deals, as Asian buyers are populating the market, said Michael Rudder, a broker at Time Equities. Feng shui has been used in the past as well, The Real Deal reported in a webcast, with brokers using unconventional methods, including a cleansing ritual used by a feng shui consultant to help sell apartments. Rudder — who first encountered feng shui in 2007 — said that since the number of Asian buyers and lessees in New York has surged this year, he and other brokers are learning just how influential it can be, the New York Times reported. Buyers often come equipped with elaborate feng shui kits to measure a property, said Rudder. With the commercial market in New York still soft, Rudder said almost all of his recent sales of office condominiums have been to foreign buyers, especially those based in Asia, where the economy is booming. “They have this huge appetite for office condos,” he said, and since they don’t want to pay rent, he has redirected his marketing plan to accommodate them. [NYT]

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As the New York City real estate market continues to struggle, brokers are turning to some unconventional methods to sell apartments. This includes rituals intended to “cleanse” the space of negative energy, according to Barbara Corcoran, founder of the Corcoran Group, one of the first to use such techniques. Homeowner Carmen Alonso, who is selling her one-bedroom apartment at 10 West 15th Street, hired Feng Shui consultant Christine Barth to perform a “clearing ceremony” in the space to help it sell. She let The Real Deal take a peek.

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