From top left: Andrew Anderson and Gail Sankarsingh of Prudential Douglas Elliman and the Setai Fifth Avenue

A 59th-floor penthouse at the Setai Fifth Avenue, a new hotel and condominium project at 400 Fifth Avenue, hit the market today for $27.5 million, according to data from Streeteasy.com. The 6,883-square-foot unit, which is being marketed by Andrew Anderson and Gail Sankarsingh of Prudential Douglas Elliman, occupies the entire floor.

Sales opened in November, with the Elliman team, led by Karen Mansour, taking over the marketing of the 60-story skyscraper, located between 36th and 37th streets, from in-house manager Elida Jacobsen Justo in May. At a party announcing the switch, Elliman officials said the property is unlike any in the New York market and they expect it to drive tremendous demand from the brokerage community.
Elliman has already seen a lot of demand for the penthouse property, Sankarsingh said, though many prospective buyers are only interested in part of the floor. – Katherine Clarke [more]

From left to right: David Greczek and Ammanda Espinal, on-site sales agents for Azure; Karen Mansour of Prudential Douglas Elliman;
John Caiazzo of the DeMatteis Organization; and Doug MacLaury of the Mattone Group (standing). Right: Azure at 333 East 91st Street.

From the July issue: A luxury apartment building towering 34 boxy stories above low-rise Yorkville shops, Azure has always been nondescript by design, and yet theatrically imposing in reality.
Launched in 2007, the project was aimed at Manhattan’s growing population of families. Marketing materials emphasized child-oriented neighborhood amenities and focused on the customizable, three-, four- and five-bedroom units on offer. Azure was not meant to excite comment; however, time and again, it has failed.
In May 2008, five months after Azure’s initial sales launch, a 200-foot crane collapsed at the site of the project, killing two construction workers, forcing a temporary shutdown of then-agent Nancy Packes’ marketing efforts, and sealing the building’s fate as headline fodder in the still ongoing legal saga that followed. (Crane owner James Lomma is currently awaiting trial on manslaughter charges after a judge turned down his bid to have the case dismissed.) [more]

L haus’ exterior, interior and rooftop and Elliman’s Karen Mansour

Long Island City’s L haus condominium reached the all-important 51-percent-sold milestone, opening the doors for new financing and buying options. As The Real Deal previously reported, selling 51 percent of units has become a sort of “magic number” since the downturn because it allows for a special Fannie Mae waiver that gives buyers better mortgage rates. Moreover, it’s typically the threshold needed to ease institutional lenders’ financing fears for prospective buyers. But prospective buyers at the 122-unit L-shaped condo at 11-02 49th Avenue gain another purchasing option with the milestone: the ability to buy penthouse units that the Stahl Organization, which developed the building, put on the market upon reaching the sales threshold. TRD Comments

Setai Fifth Avenue developer Bizzi & Partners hosted more than 200 brokers at the building’s two 60th floor penthouse units last night to formally introduce Prudential Douglas Elliman as its exclusive sales and marketing broker (see photos above). The building had been previously marketed in-house. Giuseppe Rossi, executive vice president at Bizzi & Partners, welcomed the crowd and Elliman Chairman Howard Lorber introduced his team, led by Karen Mansour, executive vice president of sales and marketing at Douglas Elliman Developments. The tower, located at 400 Fifth Avenue at the corner of 36th Street, includes a 214-room luxury hotel and 184 condominium units, and Elliman officials said the property is unlike any in the New York market and they expect it to drive tremendous demand from the brokerage community. TRD

Elliman’s Karen Mansour and 400 Fifth Avenue

Prudential Douglas Elliman will officially be named the new broker for the Setai Fifth Avenue, the luxury hotel and condominium from developer Bizzi & Partners, which now faces an amended lawsuit from the Setai Group for another $50 million, The Real Deal has learned. Karen Mansour, the director of development marketing at Elliman, will lead the new sales team, hoping to raise flagging sales at the 400 Fifth Avenue tower, which includes a 214-room hotel and a 184-unit condo. Sales previously had been managed internally by Elida Jacobsen Justo, director of sales at the Setai, who previously told The Real Deal that nearly 50 percent of the units had been sold. [more]

Elliman’s Karen Mansour and L haus

Long Island City condo development L haus has just garnered Federal Housing Administration financing approval, according to Karen Mansour, an executive vice president with Prudential Douglas Elliman, who is handling sales at the 122-unit building. The FHA approval will allow buyers to receive up to 96.5 percent financing on home loans. Prices on units, which range in size frm 675 square feet to 1,800 square feet and come in one-, two- and three-bedroom layouts, start at $465,000 and peak at $1.31 million. “Receiving FHA approval is a great accomplishment for L haus,” Mansour said. “Over the past couple of years obtaining a mortgage has been complicated and the qualifying factors have been more stringent, but with the FHA option we hope financing will be easier for prospective buyers.” TRD

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Elliman Chairman Howard Lorber (left) and the Apthorp

The owners of the Apthorp, an iconic but troubled apartment building on
the Upper West Side, have slashed prices by roughly one-third in the
wake of their recent brush with foreclosure. Renovated condominium units at the block-through limestone building
will now sell for an average of about $1,950 per square foot,
according to Karen Mansour, director of sales and marketing for
Prudential Douglas Elliman’s Development Marketing Group, who is
overseeing sales at the condo conversion. That represents a dramatic
drop in prices from the building’s initial offering plan, released in
June, which called for prices of nearly $3,000 per square foot. Early buyers at the building, which spans an entire block between
Broadway and West End Avenue on 79th Street, have the option to buy
either renovated or “as-is” apartments, said Howard Lorber, chairman of
Elliman. Unrenovated units will sell for roughly $1,650 per square foot. The price chop is the largest across-the-board reduction for a new
condo or conversion project since the Wall Street meltdown this fall,
said Jonathan Miller, president of appraisal firm Miller Samuel. The
closest contender was a recent price cut at Northside Piers in
Williamsburg that averaged 20 percent. [more]