At some point, they’ll have to start labeling the apartments at 15 Central Park West “price upon request.”
The neoclassical Robert A.M. Stern-designed building is home to Denzel Washington, Sting and a host of asking prices that would make even a megastar’s eyes pop.
Last month, penthouse 40B went on
the market for $80 million. That same apartment was purchased for $21.5 million just two months earlier, according to public records.
While asking nearly four times the purchase price might take some moxie, there are reportedly units in the limestone trophy building carrying resale asking prices as high as $150 million.
Which leads to the question, “How high can prices actually go?” Real estate brokers and buyers in the building defend the stratospheric listings, while other real estate experts find the asking prices suspect.
Jessica Armstead, a vice president at the Corcoran Group, said of 40B, “It wouldn’t surprise me if it did sell for $80 million.”
The bulls cite several contributing factors: Prices for units at 15 Central Park West were originally negotiated as far back as three years ago; prices have been climbing in Manhattan overall, despite the slowing sales pace in the wake of the credit crisis, and the high-end market remains strong.
Also, many residents have made significant renovations to their apartments, to the tune of $1,000 to $2,000 a foot, said appraiser Andrew Fautley, a principal at Vanderbilt Appraisal.
Yet some sellers have been dropping prices on resales — and the two most expensive sales to close at the building as of last month were nowhere near $80 million.
Hedge fund manager Daniel S. Loeb paid the most for a unit in the building at $45 million for penthouse 39, followed by Citigroup chairman emeritus Sanford Weill’s $42.4 million penthouse 20. Weill’s unit boasts the most expensive price per square foot on a closed sale, at $6,288 per interior square foot. (The unit also has 2,007 square feet of outdoor space.) If 40B sells for $80 million, it would achieve an astonishing $15,163 per square foot.
“I would say that $6,000 a square foot for a good park view in either the Tower or the House is very achievable, and they have been getting those prices easily,” said Robby Browne, a senior vice president at the Corcoran Group, who bought unit 6J for $2.7 million last November.
“The more special apartments priced at $75 to $90 million are a different breed within the building,” Browne said. “Some have terraces, and others, 14-foot ceilings. That is a different buyer, and it remains to be seen what dollar per square foot they will get.
“I see the building climbing to $10,000 per square foot for park views fairly quickly as more people move in, more people visit friends in the building and see what a
wonderful place it is.”
Still, the asking prices seem out of alignment with buildings of the same ilk. Other units in that price range, such as a $70 million penthouse listing at the Pierre Hotel, can be hard to move. The Pierre penthouse has been on the market for four years; five years earlier, the three-story apartment at the hotel sold for less than one-third of its current asking price.
“The current listings suggest a range of value of $15,000 to $16,000 per square foot based upon current closed data in comparable luxury projects. These numbers appear to be double current market levels,” Fautley said.
“In my opinion it becomes a fashion sale, not a market-derived sale. That is, until one of them sells.”
The developers of 15 Central Park West, Zeckendorf brothers Arthur and William, built what is considered the crème de la crème of condos because of its location, between 61st and 62nd streets and Central Park West and Broadway; its prewar style without the prewar construction; its services, including a swimming pool and private dining room for guests; and the fact that it is a condo, allowing rentals and avoiding the strict board approval process of co-ops.
Dorothy Somekh, a senior vice president at Halstead Property, and a partner bought unit 7J for $2.55 million in November 2007. They sold it at the beginning of March for $4.85 million, almost double what they paid for it. She suspected had she waited until last month, she could have gotten as much as $5.5 million. And if they waited a year, they likely could have received even more because the building would be completed. She said she sold the unit at the urging of her partner.
The pace of rentals has not matched the volume of sales in the building, but the rents have been high. A three-bedroom apartment rented last month for $29,000 per month, according to real estate data site StreetEasy.