There's a reason why The Apthorp comes up so often here at the New Construction Manhattan blog -- the Upper West Side pre-war condo conversion is a beautiful building even by the high standards for , and the apartments for sale at The Apthorp are routinely among the most sought-after condo listings on our site. But there's also another reason why The Apthorp is all over the NCM blog -- it's great copy, and has been the subject of a truly epic series of and . That -- well, that and the fact that we seldom cover broker-related drama in the Manhattan real estate world -- is why we didn't make a big deal about it when The Apthorp dropped Prudential Douglas Elliman as its sales and marketing agent back in October.

Do not adjust your browser. The New Construction Manhattan blog is currently in Service Mode. Which is basically the New Construction Manhattan blog operating as it usually does, only with us taking time out from our usual obsessive analysis of the minutia of the Manhattan condo market to deliver real estate news that those browsing Manhattan apartment listings might actually be able to use. (Don't worry, we won't do the this-is-quite-useful thing too often) Today, via New York Magazine's S. Jhoanna Robledo, comes a guide to the four biggest and most frequent misrepresentations in Manhattan apartment sales. It's not quite accurate to call these common real estate agent fudges "lies" -- but it's not quite accurate to call that glorified walk-in closet a bedroom, either.

Pity 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.”

Wait, we're still talking about this summer's market for Manhattan apartments? NYC condominium sales in August? You're sure? Strangely, but inarguably, the answer is yes -- unlike with rental statistics, the indicators on the market for Manhattan apartments are a bit longer in gestation, and... well, yes, this is going to be a blog post about a recent report on the NYC condominium market for August, but it's also a post about the most recent statistics we have on apartments for sale in Manhattan. Real estate is funny that way. And what is in this report? Good news, less-good news, and more proof that -- slowly, steadily and undeniably -- the Manhattan condo market is returning to health. So, then. Cast your mind back to this summer -- it was warmer, the Mets were still bumming everybody out, and the expiration of the first-time home-buyer tax credit sent apartment sales cratering in July, to the tune of a 34% decline in sales. Which everyone expected -- the first-time home-buyer tax credit had just expired, if you're just joining us -- but which was also the biggest decline since Radar Logic began tracking these stats in 2000. This means that it would have been just about impossible not to see some sort of improvement in August -- and there was some improvement in August. As it turned out, it was the kind that those searching for NYC condos would most want to see -- one in which prices increased marginally, while sales increased at a faster rate.

The first rule of Manhattan real estate -- of real estate in general -- is said to be "location, location, location." Which, as conventional wisdom goes, isn't the silliest thing in the world. But Manhattan real estate observers could be forgiven, in recent years, for believing that at least one of those "location"'s could be swapped out for "branding." New Manhattan neighborhoods are nothing new -- New York City is a study in flux, and all it takes is one zoning decision and a few bold real estate developers to turn a neighborhood like the nowheresville around the Lincoln Tunnel entrance into a newly branded Manhattan neighborhood between Chelsea and Midtown West that comes complete with its own new construction condo listings and superstar condos such as The Atelier. What sets Hudson Square apart from The Linc, besides a much cooler name, is that this new neighborhood is actually one of Manhattan's oldest. Hudson Square is, for all intents and purposes, West Soho.

If you have ever visited The High Line park in Chelsea, you have probably seen a few things. The tasteful plantings and unique aesthetic contours of The High Line itself, for one. The crowds of pretty young NYC things and happy tourists taking the Hudson River views and generally making the park that much more scenic, for another. And over and around it all is something every bit as dramatic, but much easier to miss -- there's West Chelsea itself, growing up and growing into itself and generally making New Yorkers forget that there was ever a time when the words "luxury condominium" and "Tenth Avenue" just plain didn't go together.

It made sense at first, all those visitors to New Construction Manhattan clicking on the listing for Upper West Side condominium The Apthorp. It made sense because The Apthorp has always been among our most popular Upper West Side condo listings -- it's generally one of the most-clicked buildings in our Manhattan condo listings database, in fact -- and because it's a beautiful building filled with beautiful apartments for sale. Business as usual, right? Except they kept clicking. And clicking. The reason, we quickly figured out, was this story from the New York Post, which detailed what seemed like an incredible deal -- a (small) penthouse apartment at The Apthorp selling for $228,000, which is roughly 88% below its listing price. We'd click, too, if we read a story about apartments for sale in one of the hottest pre-war condominiums on the Upper West Side. So, how incredible was this deal?

We at New Construction Manhattan have had our collective eye -- we just share one, it's easier -- on The Aldyn for some time. Few new construction condo listings on the Upper West Side -- honestly, few new construction condo listings anywhere in Manhattan -- were as ambitious in conception as The Aldyn, which shares a perch on lower Riverside Drive with luxury rental The Ashley. It wasn't just that The Aldyn was a sterling example of shoot-the-moon ambition on the part of developers Extell, although it's that. It's that The Aldyn was a fearlessly upscale new construction condominium development built during one of the lowest down-cycles in real estate development in... well, ever. The project itself was promising from the start – between The Aldyn's striking looks, the 40,000 square feet of amenitized space and the stunning Hudson River views and generous floor plans on offer in the apartments for sale, The Aldyn always sounded like a winner. It was the timing that seemed questionable. But with the building nearly complete and The Aldyn's signature amenity space set to open -- and with pictures revealing it to be every bit as expansive and plain awesome-looking as advertised -- it seems safe to say that The Aldyn has made it. Which makes the La Palestra amenity space at The Aldyn that much more worthy of a look.

During the boom years in Manhattan real estate, it seemed like new construction condominiums -- and a host of new Manhattan condominium listings -- hit the market every week, each more spectacularly amenitized, dramatically turned out and eye-poppingly expensive than the last. It was a good time, in short, to be a real estate developer -- with plenty of buyers and a housing market that seemed on an endless upward trend, new construction NYC condos essentially sold themselves.