Real estate lexicon has no shortage of superlatives, which crowds the playing field for a concept like “the best block in New York City.”
Nevertheless, the level of activity on East 70th Street between Park and Lexington avenues makes it a bona fide contender, both in terms of buzz and bucks — the marquee townhouses that line its sidewalks are fetching eyebrow-raising prices from top-tier buyers. The block is the future home of film director Woody Allen — who in February reportedly purchased 118 East 70th Street for an unknown sum. New listings and a $24.5 million purchase last month have kept the street in boldface type of late, particularly among the city’s elite real estate brokers.
They say the neighborhood has a certain je ne sais quoi — but when asked, seem more than willing to try to pin it down.
“The feeling you get when you go into this [block] is so much better than when you go into any other place,” said Richard Steinberg, a senior managing director at Warburg Realty Partnership. “It’s the most beautiful townhouse block in New York City.”
Steinberg handled the sale of a 30-foot townhouse on the north side of the block for $11.4 million in early 2005. A developer intending to reconfigure the existing apartments back into a single-family home seemed ready to move ahead with his plans. Then an unexpected buyer showed up: president and executive creative director of Coach Inc., Reed Krakoff, who bought the property for $17 million in the fall of 2005, according to property records.
“We had an unsolicited offer from a very prominent New Yorker, who’s going to use it for his family home,” Steinberg said. “This gentleman could have bought anything anywhere for his family, and he felt this was the most beautiful block in New York.”
As of early February, two other properties on the block were listed for sale, one of which had sold by the middle of the month. A 40-foot townhouse at 125 East 70th Street owned by the late philanthropist Paul Mellon and his widow Rachel Lambert Mellon — a pedigree that some brokers say has been a big draw for the block since the 1960s, when the house was built — sold for $24.5 million. It’s noted for its striking French-style façde (but rather cramped interior). The other property was 110 East 70th Street, which listed for $17 million on the south side of the block, a 20-foot house that has been lavishly renovated, brokers say.
So what is it about 70th Street between Park and Lexington that has captivated elite buyers? Much of it has to do with the housing stock on the block, as well as the neighboring properties on north 69th and south 71st Streets, which also have squat townhouses.
“They’re low buildings, so you’ve got your light,” said Laurence Kaiser IV, president of Key-Ventures Realty. “And you have gardens facing gardens — not gardens facing up against an apartment wall. It’s built to a human scale.”
Jed Garfield of Leslie J. Garfield & Co., a firm of townhouse experts, agreed that this portion of East 70th Street is similar to East 95th Street between Park and Lexington, backing up against very low buildings. Also, the street has wider sidewalks than other Upper East Side blocks.
“So many blocks of New York City are chopped up with these larger prewar or postwar buildings that cast shadows,” he said. “So just from an aesthetic view, this is an attractive block.”
That’s a particularly valuable attribute for some buildings, like 110 East 70th Street, a turn-of-the-previous-century townhouse that has three exposures in back rooms because of a wedge laced with greenery lying between it and the condominiums at 715 Park Avenue, Kaiser said. “It has windows on all four sides, and there’s nothing to the right of it, which is highly unusual,” agreed listing broker Suzanne Sealy of Prudential Douglas Elliman.
The block is known as an iconic townhouse row because out of its two dozen properties, about half are single-family homes currently and two are being reconfigured into single-family homes.
“In my opinion, it’s the most homogenous street,” said Steinberg, who recently sold a 20-foot Victorian-style townhouse with multiple dwellings and commercial space at 130 East 70th Street for $6.5 million to a development team planning to convert it to a single-family home.
Steinberg said he anticipates the new home, which is being designed by Eric Cohler, will be listed for $14.5 million in the coming months. Chances are the Victorian-style townhouse may do well on a block that has seen prices shoot upward in the past few years.
The Georgian-style house reportedly purchased by Allen last traded in 1998 for $6.8 million — a phenomenally high price at the time for a 20-footer — while the asking price was $7.3 million, said Sami Hassoumi, managing director and townhouse specialist at Brown Harris Stevens. The asking price in early January had reportedly more than tripled to $25.9 million, though the house was expected to have traded at a somewhat smaller figure, perhaps $20 million.
“There’s definitely something special about that house,” Hassoumi said. “It sounds pretty basic, but it’s so hard to find those houses that are simple and elegant and airy throughout.”
Besides these high-profile homes, the “average” properties of East 70th Street continue to attract well-heeled buyers drawn to the many architectural styles on display. “You have different forms of architecture, from Palladian to Georgian to neo-Classical to modern,” Steinberg said. “You have an Edward Durell Stone house.”
The block draws minimal traffic, increasing the arcadian ambiance, but isn’t far from supermarkets and boutiques. Garfield adds that three of the city’s most coveted co-ops are on Park Avenue at 70th Street, which most likely adds to the block’s allure. “When people talk about the best co-operative buildings in New York, they always talk about 720, 730, and 740, which are right at the end of the block,” Garfield said.
Kirk Henckels, director of Stribling Private Brokerage, said East 70th Street rivals at least one other block in the city for renown. East 64th Street between Fifth and Madison avenues is the city’s showcase mansion block. There were three sales of mansions there hovering between $20 and $30 million in the past year. Connoisseurs consider mansions to be freestanding homes more than 25 feet wide. The two blocks each have their own distinct charm.
“Now, East 70th Street may be a more classic townhouse block — as opposed to a mansion block — but it’s certainly everybody’s favorite in that sense,” Henckels said. “It’s a beautiful tree-lined street, and it has beautiful traditional townhouses.”
Among other Upper East Side blocks rivaling East 70th Street, brokers say, are 71st Street between Fifth and Madison; 62nd Street between Fifth and Madison; 80th Street between Park and Lexington; 67th Street from Fifth to Madison; and lengths of 73rd and 78th streets.