NYC Daily Real Estate Blog

If we were perhaps a little too goofy for the (awesome) new Nouvel in Chelsea in yesterday's New Construction Manhattan blog post, it's worth noting that we are only slightly less over-the-moon for the very cool-looking and impressively lavish One Madison Park, a luxury condominium in the Flatiron District at 23 East 22nd Street. But while the condos for sale at One Madison Park are pretty much beyond reproach, the building itself has suffered through an... interesting period of late, with the developers getting into trouble with creditors and the entire building's brand taking something of a hit in the process. As we've seen at Battery Park City's Riverhouse, wrangling among the money people doesn't necessarily harm a luxury condo's viability, but One Madison Park's struggles have been more public than most. In a longish, interesting piece in the New York Observer, Dana Rubinstein proves that One Madison Park's issues are also more interesting than most.

We've devoted many pixels here at the New Construction Manhattan blog to the buyer-friendly trends in the market for NYC condos, and with good reason -- this is a pretty excellent time to be buying a condominium in Manhattan, for a myriad of reasons. That said, a look at the prices for NYC condos at present might make it seem like the buyer's market in NYC real estate is... well, not nearly buyer-friendly enough. And it might indeed seem that way, were you to look at the prices for, say, condos on the Upper West Side or Upper East Side. But the most important thing to note is this: per a recent report at The Real Deal, no one is actually paying those prices. In fact, most condos for sale in Manhattan are currently selling for somewhere between five and 30 percent less than their list prices. Why is this?

Buying a condominium in Manhattan is not easy. If there's one thing you'll hear from friends who've gone about purchasing a Manhattan apartment or NYC condo, it's that. But if there's one thing we keep going over here at the New Construction Manhattan blog, it's that buying NYC condos doesn't have to be quite as difficult as it is -- if you ask the right questions and work with the right real estate agent, buying an apartment in Manhattan can be satisfying and maybe even enjoyable. But, as proven in a new report at The Real Deal on the radically imprecise science of calculating the square footage of condominiums for sale, buying a condominium in Manhattan isn't easy.

We hear the term "buyer's market" so often of late in reference to the current real estate market that it's easy, at times, to forget just what it means. The phrase itself isn't tough to decipher, of course: buyers of NYC condos have an advantage over sellers of NYC condos at present. But a new report from Zillow.com indicates the real-world effects -- the very positive real world effects, at least for those looking into buying a Manhattan apartment -- of the current buyer's market in Manhattan real estate. On average, Manhattan apartment buyers paid a whopping five percent less than the last listed price on NYC condos in January. That's a savings of over $20,000 per purchase, on average.

Buying an apartment or condo is a big decision, wherever said apartment or condo is located. But when we're talking about NYC condos, both the level of investment on your part and the competition on the lender's part are amped up considerably. The New York City real estate market can be a tough place, of course, but choosing to work with a trustworthy real estate agent and educating yourself on the rules of the mortgage game are good ways to make buying a Manhattan apartment that much simpler. The New Construction Manhattan Broker Network is a good way to ensure that you'll find a knowledgeable agent, of course; reading Ken Harney's piece at The Real Deal on the importance of the government-mandated "Good Faith Estimate" (or GFE) is a good way to get started on the educating-yourself thing.