Manhattan’s luxury market got off to a strong start in February, with 26 contracts signed at or above $4 million, according to Olshan Realty’s weekly luxury market report. It was the best week since the first full week of December, when 30 contracts were signed.
The rising stock market could partly explain the jump in activity, though the Dow Jones’ 666-point plunge on Friday is cause for concern, Olshan noted.
The top contract went to a pair of separate cond-op units on Fifth Avenue that will be combined into an 8,500-square-foot home.
Units 11S and 11N at 995 Fifth Avenue had a combined asking price of $29.75 million. Hedge fund manager Matthew McLennan paid a total of $25.72 million for both units, buying the larger one for $14.42 million in 2008 and then picking up the smaller one for $11.3 million in 2012.
Extell Development converted the Rosario Candela-designed former Stanhope Hotel overlooking the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2007. Elsewhere in the building, Claude Wasserstein, the third wife of the late financier Bruce Wasserstein, put her duplex penthouse on the market in November for $65 million, though the listing is no longer available on StreetEasy.
A duplex penthouse at One Madison claimed the No. 2 spot for the week. The 6,620-square-foot condominium had an asking price of $26.95 million, a 28 percent reduction to the $37.5 million it was asking when it went on the market in September 2013.
The week’s asking-price contract volume totaled $211.75 million, with a median asking price of $5.18 million. There was a 10 percent average discount from original asking price to last asking price, and luxury homes spent an average of 420 days on the market. [Olshan Realty] – Rich Bockmann