Last year, when a baker’s dozen of its apartments sat on the market unsold, River House on East 52nd Street abruptly changed its ways. Famously known for its close-mouthed, closed-door policies (brokers were not allowed to speak its name, and its turndowns of prospective buyers were legend), River House broke its silence to say it had loosened up — the co-op would allow open houses and name checks, too.
Last fall, when the Post revealed that Uma Thurman bought an apartment in River House, the building’s comeback was official. Today, only three units remain: a triplex penthouse offered at $14.95 million, a sleek modern 10-room simplex at $11.9 million and a 10-room for $8,888,888. “There’s no doubt,” says a resident, “it’s turning around. The pace of sales has been brisk and accelerating.”
In prime locations across Manhattan, once-fashionable apartment houses are beginning to reclaim their real estate prominence. Buyers who have recently flocked to modern starchitect towers are re-discovering the buildings with provenance.
Two key real estate trends are at play with these “comeback cribs.” As prices of new condos rise, old-style co-ops have seen their per-share and per-square-foot values languish, prompting boards to change unfriendly policies, focus on financial management and upgrade properties to compete in the luxury marketplace.
Ironically, the same flashy new luxury towers are now creating halo effects that benefit elderly co-op neighbors.
This year, several “top tier” co-op boards have contacted brokers “about improving the perception of their buildings,” says an Upper East Side realtor. One is quite surprising: Rosario Candela and Mott Schmidt’s 19 E. 72nd St., which cognoscenti consider among the East Side’s best buildings — and an insider’s secret. More modest than some of its neighbors (it opened just after the Depression ended the first golden age of luxury apartments and has somewhat smaller units), it appeals to locals who want to downsize, just a smidgen. The building’s board isn’t talking, but three months ago, the co-op suspended summer work rules that limited renovations, waived a ban on pied-à-terres, and agreed to let trusts buy apartments. The latter maneuver is particularly momentous. Unlike condos — which permit the stealthy wealthy to hide behind trusts and LLCs — co-ops have long barred such ploys to keep certain breeds of wolf from their doors. But in today’s marketplace, that limits the buyer pool — especially international buyers — thus depressing a building’s value.
That said, many are still unlikely to pass through the limestone portals of a building like 19 E. 72nd, which famously rejected Richard Nixon. Two duplexes there have recently gone into contract — a 10-room unit for just under $13 million and an eight-room for $7.75 million — but as a resident says, “We still want the same kind of people.” And if you don’t know what that means, you’re not one of them.
Nearly 20 blocks southward, meanwhile, is Plaza 400, an East 56th Street — a co-op that is similarly softening its rules. The 1968 building has 581 apartments, two-thirds spacious studios and one-bedrooms that generally fetch under $1 million. Recently, a two-bedroom sold for $1.6 million and a four-bedroom combination fetched $2.5 million, but the building was “notorious for [board] turndowns,” says a broker, until, “for some reason, they woke up.” This spring, brokers were invited to lunch — with a side of mea culpa. “Every board member spoke and said, ‘Yes, we’ve been terrible, but we’ve changed.’”
Its board president, Ana Giglio, concedes that the building’s formal financial requirements — particularly the ratio of carrying costs to assets — were “unrealistic,” so it now considers each purchaser individually. The building decreased required down payments, added a gym, renovated the lounge beside its heated rooftop pool, and is upgrading its lobby and porte cochère. Also significant, if less sexy, is a new heating system. “It’s a little too soon to tell” if the outreach will raise values, says Giglio, but “it was very well received.”
Co-op boards aren’t alone in seeking to enhance the value of their apartments. Until 15 Central Park West opened, its twin-towered next-door neighbor, the Century, was the area’s reigning condominium. But the Art Deco masterpiece reflected its 1931 opening: Apartments were smaller than in neighboring palaces like the Beresford and the San Remo, so it never had their cachet.
Now, the Century is a hot property, and not only because its residents include celebrities like U2’s Larry Mullen, Jr. Some have combined units and undertaken down-to-the-slab renovations. The Soviet-born investor Len Blavatnik assembled 1½ floors and Amazon’s Jeff Bezos owns a 10,000-square-foot home there.
The Century’s costliest listing, a proposed combination of two units into a nine-room duplex with over 60 feet of park frontage, is asking just under $9 million — a bargain compared to 15 CPW, where a similar apartment will set you back more than twice that sum.
Board president Mike Kelly acknowledges his neighbor’s success has rubbed off on the Century’s real estate value, but considers his stringent financial oversight more important. “I do nothing but run budgets,” he says, “constantly making the building more efficient.” The Century also invests in itself, and in a few months, when multi-year façade work is concluded, he promises, “we’ll have the place brand-spanking new.” It has lately commanded $2,000 per square foot, and the sellers of that top-priced combo unit are looking for just under $3,000.
A few blocks southeast, Alwyn Court, once home to writers Joan Didion and John Gregory Dunne and actors Natasha Richardson and Liam Neeson (as well as formerly this story’s reporter), is also experiencing a spike in values. Though it’s a cooperative, its prime position on the Billionaire’s Belt — next door to One57, close to 15 CPW and more under-construction towers on Central Park South and West 57th Street — has recent buyers paying condo-like sums. “We can hold our own among the billionaires,” says an owner. “Our board reflects the sophistication of our owners: They allow pets, pied-a-terres, foreign buyers.”
A two-bedroom apartment with a park view recently closed for a building-record $2.85 million, and the largest of its penthouses, a 2,800-square-foot combination with three exposures and a wraparound terrace, is asking just under $8 million.
“The whole area is changing, with very hot buildings and very high-priced apartments,” says Douglas Elliman broker Karen Bressler of the Midtown corridor. “Alwyn Court is one of the only prewar co-ops there and nothing is as desirable as a prewar.”
A few blocks east of Alwyn Court, the city’s soon-to-be-tallest apartment tower — 432 Park Ave. — is raising hopes of raised values at 470 Park Ave. The latter, a Schwartz & Gross building, dates to 1916, when its stretch of Park Avenue was chic, before the northward march of development left it “too far south,” says Corcoran broker Wendy J. Sarasohn, who owns an apartment at 470 Park Ave. “Now, it’s there again.” A listing for a $5 million, five-room corner apartment there crows: “A block from 432 Park!”
It’s the same proximity game on lower Fifth Avenue — where nearby Greenwich Village condos are luring big-budget buyers. One of the prettiest buildings in Greenwich Village, the 1905 Beaux-Arts 43 Fifth Ave., once had two 10-room apartments per floor and was home to Marlon Brando and novelist Dawn Powell. More recently, actress Jeanne Tripplehorn sold her apartment to Jennifer Jason Leigh and her writer-director husband Noah Baumbach, who combined it with an adjacent unit (Baumbach remains after their 2013 divorce). Julia Roberts also owned there before selling to Holly Hunter. That nine-room apartment is on the market again (for $8.25 million), as is a $4.795 million penthouse under the mansard roof.
As new condos in the West Village get more attention, the board at 43 Fifth has spent years upgrading its landmark, notes president Donald Farley. “We have a very simple game plan to keep up with the world,” he says. “We’re [preserving] the building for what it is while working pro-actively with purchasers who want extensive renovations.”
Those purchasers have restored several apartments that were cut up over the years and helped pay for a new roof, elevators and restored copper facings atop the façade. A restoration of the jaw-dropping lobby has begun. The building always had “a wow factor,” says Farley. “Now, we want wow! We keep records of per-share value and they’ve been going up for several years.”
There are lessons here for sellers and building boards. “Proximity is part of it,” says Steven James, president of Manhattan brokerage at Douglas Elliman of New York’s “comeback cribs.” But it’s not enough. Older buildings “can sit back and watch new ones take their value away or they can learn to compete. All these buildings have something to offer. They got shuffled off to the side but they came back. Everybody wants that for their building. But you have to desperately want it.”
Michael Gross is the author of “House of Outrageous Fortune,” which was released in March.