Condo at Waldorf Astoria Chicago Sells for $5.3M

A condo on Chicago’s Gold Coast closed for $5.3 million this week, extending the Waldorf Astoria building’s streak of substantial price cuts preceding deals.

The sale came at an 18 percent markdown from the condo’s original asking price when it first came onto the market in 2019 for $6.5 million.

The three-bedroom, four-bathroom condo at the Waldorf Astoria closed this week after going under contract Oct. 1. The 4,000-square-foot condo is a half-floor unit with two terraces, views of Lake Michigan and high-end finishes.

“We priced the home well below the market to sell it,” said Julie Harron, an agent with Jameson Sotheby’s Int’l Realty who represented both the buyers and sellers on the deal. It was originally priced at $6.5 million for just a week in 2019 with a different broker, and the seller at that time decided to keep it after cutting the price to $6.2 million for more than a month, she said.

The sellers are not listed in public records and the buyers are not yet identified. The condo last sold for $5 million in 2016, and the sellers had put $1.2 million into upgrades, said Harron, so the latest deal marks a haircut from the total investment in the property.

The deal follows a pattern of sellers accepting price cuts to make deals seen in other recent transactions at the Waldorf and throughout Chicago’s luxury market. Such concessions have been required despite this year’s high volume of deals for properties in the priciest segment of Chicago’s housing stock — which is considered $4 million and up — amid the broader housing market downturn brought on by interest rate hikes.

Billionaire Ken Griffin’s sale of his longtime Chicago home in the Waldorf building closed last month for $10.2 million, an 11 percent discount from its $11.5 million asking price when it hit the market in July.

The five-bedroom, 7,400-square-foot unit on the 37th floor was listed in July and went under contract Sept. 26. Griffin was poised to take a loss on the home even if it had sold at its full listing price. He bought it in 2014 for $13.3 million. Harron also represented the buyer’s side of that deal.

Also in October, sellers of a penthouse at the Waldorf had to take a steep price cut to make a sale. Scott Saldana, founder of SKTY Trading, and Elyssa Saldana sold their full-floor condo building for $9.4 million. The couple had the condo listed for 15 months and trimmed their initial asking price by more than a third to reach a deal with the buyer.

The couple first listed the 6,400-square-foot, 55th-floor condo in June 2021 for $15 million before removing it from the market and relisting it in May at $12.5 million. They paid $6.3 million for the property in 2010.

Built in 2009, the Waldorf Astoria building includes condos on the upper floors and a hotel on the lower portion. Condo owners in the 60-story get access to the hotel’s amenities through a fee in their association assessments. Those include 24-hour security, room service, access to the spa, indoor pool, fitness center and Pilates studio.