UES townhouse sells for $14.5M

A five-floor townhouse at 17 East 77th Street has sold for $14.5 million, after spending only four days on the market, brokers told The Real Deal.

The brownstone, which has its own gym and garden, measures just over 18 feet wide, according to Laurence Kaiser, a broker at Key-Ventures who represented both seller and buyer with a colleague, Vice President Craig Dix.

The seller, a woman named Norma Smith, who also owns homes in Connecticut and London, wanted to close the sale before the end of the calendar year, Kaiser said. The sale moved quickly once the buyer, a corporation, expressed a willingness to complete the deal quickly. The unit “needs a little work,” Kaiser said, but he called the final sale figure “a great price” given that the building has no elevator or central air conditioning.

Smith purchased the home in 2002, according to city records, but recently decided to downsize, according to the brokers. “She didn’t want to live alone on five floors,” Kaiser said. She recently purchased another, smaller home, also on the Upper East Side, the brokers said.