Articles on The New York Times

Park Avenue Apartments For Everyone: New York Times Charts The Rise of Park Avenue South

Thu, 03/03/2011 - 20:57

Park Avenue NYC Luxury ApartmentsA Park Avenue apartment is a Park Avenue apartment, but when people brag, dote and obsess on the idea of a Park Avenue condominium, they're not talking about the comparatively modest stretch of Park Avenue south of Grand Central Station. Long considered a poor relative of the “real” Park Avenue of the Upper East Side, Park Avenue South has lately stepped out as an address worth attention in its own right -- both because apartments for sale on Park Avenue South offer some decent value per square foot, and has lately come into its own as a place to live and socialize. Convenient, walkable and steadily breaking its associations with unromantic Midtown East, Park Avenue South is finally getting its due.

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(Midtown) West Side Story: Luxury Condo The Sheffield Is Making A Comeback

Thu, 02/24/2011 - 20:46

The Sheffield Luxury Condos for SaleBack in 2005, a team of developers purchased The Sheffield -- which was then known as Sheffield 57 and has always been located at 322 West 57th Street -- for $418 million. That was a record for a residential building in Manhattan, but impressive though that price tag was, it made sense. The Sheffield had a prime Midtown West location, a host of luxurious apartments for sale, and the promise of a stellar suite of amenities. But while The Sheffield was then, as it is now, one of the more interesting condo listings in Manhattan, what happened between then and now was, if anything, too interesting.

A seemingly unending series of legal disputes (and an Andrew Cuomo-mandated sales freeze) kept The Sheffield in the news, but also kept it from living up to its sky-high potential as one of the elite condo listings in Midtown West. For awhile. But in 2011, The Sheffield -- now free of that "57," and free of all that drama as well -- has belatedly and deservingly emerged as a legitimate Manhattan condominium success story. Once interesting for all the wrong reasons, The Sheffield is, at last, back where it belonged -- on lists of the most desirable condo listings in midtown.

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Bump Ahead, Or Why Waiting To Buy A Manhattan Apartment Could Cost You Money

Mon, 01/24/2011 - 20:42

Waiting on a manhattan apartment may cost you money

In the years since the economic collapse, we have seen a wide array of metaphors deployed to describe both what just happened and what lies ahead. Some were more felicitous than others and none quite did the trick, but when it comes to summing up the current situation in the market for Manhattan condominiums, "like turning around a battleship" isn't bad at all. This particular pundit-approved cliche is unusually apt when it comes to describing the Manhattan condominium market's a slow, steady and maddeningly gradual ongoing comeback. Given the extent of the slump in the Manhattan real estate market, this is to be expected -- and is even somewhat advantageous for those browsing Manhattan apartment listings, as condo prices are still relatively low, and price cuts still comparatively common. But a recent article in the New York Times serves as a sobering reminder of both how deep the real estate trough of the last few years actually was, and as a warning that -- once we finally get this battleship turned around -- there may still be some choppy seas ahead for those looking to buy a condo in Manhattan.

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It Takes Two: Two-Bedroom Manhattan Apartments Back In Vogue

Mon, 11/29/2010 - 22:29

2 Bedroom apartment sales are on the rise in ManhattanPity the poor two-bedroom Manhattan apartment listing. Where once the two-bedroom apartment had once accounted for the largest percentage of NYC condo sales -- logically enough, since two-bedroom apartments are an ideal size for both young professionals and Manhattan-scale families -- this particular Manhattan residential option has experienced something of a downturn over the last few years, even out of proportion with the more general downturn in NYC real estate over the past two years. But with the Manhattan condominium market experiencing a slow but sure turnaround these days, two-bedroom NYC apartments are becoming a hot commodity once more -- a market share that was around 25 percent of the Manhattan apartment scene in '09 is back up to 39 percent, and two-bedroom apartments for sale in NYC are back in demand. The question, now, is why? In the New York Times, Vivian Toy examines the comeback of the Manhattan two-bedroom apartment listing, and comes to a surprising conclusion -- the long buyer's market that played out during the downturn in NYC real estate unexpectedly put three-bedroom Manhattan apartment listings within NYC home buyers' budgets. The result, in the words of Diana Chung, an agent with Mark David & Company, was that “two bedrooms were almost a no man’s land.”

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The Old Boom Reverberates: New York Times Salutes The Beautiful Condominiums of Last Decade's Manhattan Real Estate Boom

Tue, 08/24/2010 - 20:43

Manhattan Condos from the last decadeIt seems like we spend all our time here at the New Construction Manhattan blog sussing out the shape and size and seriousness of the ongoing Manhattan real estate recovery. Which, you know, is reasonable enough of us, given that this is a blog about NYC condos and Manhattan real estate and such. But this fine-grain focus on the present -- and attendant anxiousness to find positive indications for the future in the still-anxious present-day state of Manhattan real estate -- can sometimes limit our perspective somewhat. Not just as regards the recovery, and the search for omens and signs indicating the existence thereof, but to the basic elements of Manhattan real estate itself. All the more reason to enjoy architecture critic Jayne Merkel's piece in the New York Times on the one objective lasting benefit of the last Manhttan real estate boom -- the addition of numerous beautiful and architecturally distinguished new construction luxury condos to the Manhattan skyline. That we have many of those NYC condo listings here at New Construction Manhattan is probably worth mentioning, too, but... anyway, let's get to Merkel.

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Room(s) With A City View: Growing Market Among Growing Families For Bigger Manhattan Apartments

Thu, 07/01/2010 - 21:45

Larger looking for larger apartments in ManhattanAccording to an article in Wednesday's New York Times, three-bedroom Manhattan apartments and four-bedroom apartments are all the rage amongst families. It makes arithmetical sense, of course -- more kids, more bedrooms, Q.E.D. -- but the boom in sales of three- and four-bedroom Manhattan apartments indicates that a demographic that traditionally hightails it to the suburbs might be opting for Manhattan condos instead. Despite the fact that new condominium sales have been comparatively flat over the past year, sales of three-bedroom and four-bedroom Manhattan apartments have drastically increased -- whether it's because families are looking for more space for their children, space for guest bedrooms, or a tricked-out media room varies from case to case, of course. But clearly there's something going on here.

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