How 220 Central Park South ended Billionaires’ Row

Watch: B1M and The Real Deal spotlight the ultra-elite skyscraper and how it became the most profitable condo building in the world

Billion-dollar backroom deals. Extreme engineering. Class warfare. And an address that went from being a bastion of middle-class New York to a home base for some of the wealthiest people on Earth. If there is one tower that epitomizes the extreme stakes of luxury New York City real estate, it is 220 Central Park South. 

And we’re proud to present to you its definitive story on film.  

A joint production of The Real Deal and The B1M, this documentary takes you into all aspects of 220 CPS’ improbable rise: the developer, lost to the pages of history, that found the deal; the mighty REIT that took it over and threw out every rule in the book to build it; the complex engineering and architectural challenges; the “selling without selling” approach to marketing to billionaires; the backlash and “tale of two cities” debate; and its ultimate status as the world’s most profitable condo project. 

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It’s a story of how dramatically New York City has changed over the past two decades, and how the developers who accelerated that change became fabulously rich in the process. 

The tower cleared over $3 billion in sales and well over $1 billion in profits for its developer, Vornado Realty Trust, in a streak Vornado boss Steve Roth once compared to “winning the Kentucky Derby by 10 lengths.” 

Check out the documentary embedded above. And to read TRD‘s deep dive on 220 Central Park South that gave rise to it, click here