In a “particularly sluggish” high-end real estate market where people are struggling to fill the large number of luxury apartments in New York City, there’s a condo apartment at 220 Central Park South listed for a whopping $250 million. If sold at this price (or anywhere above the $100.5 million mark set by the One57 penthouse sale in January 2015), this will be the most expensive condo in Manhattan ever.
At 23,000 square-foot, this four-story apartment on 50th to 53rd floor is part of a 66-floor development by Vornado Realty Trust slated to open in 2018. With 16 bedrooms, 17 bathrooms, five balconies and a Central-Park facing terrace, this mega-luxurious apartment is created by combining an 11,000-square-foot duplex on the 50th and 51st floors (listed at $150 million), and three relatively smaller apartments on the 52nd and 53rd floors asking between $26.3 million and $43 million, according to the AG filing as reported by the Real Deal.
As part of a rarefied group of ‘trophy properties’—a phenomenon that came about when Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev paid double to buy an $88-million penthouse at 15 Central Park West in 2012, a listing like this $250-million apartment only comes by very few times in every decade or two, according to Jonathan Miller, Real Estate Appraiser and President and CEO of Miller Samuel Inc. Due to its rarity, he noted, “Don’t expect this to reflect a trend in the market in any way.”
Why?
“That’s because this is more of a special case rather than a specific market when you’re talking about a property within the top 0.1 percent of the top one percent,” said the real estate expert. Some developers may have believed there’s a “yet-to-be-harvested, nine-digit New York housing market,” Miller told Associated Press, but many have failed to realize their “aspirational pricing.”
Even when killer views, Central Park location, luxurious amenities, and state-of-the-art finishes are some of the features expected from a listing of this caliber, there is no hard-and-fast rule in explaining this price tag or ‘trophy-market’ status. Just as haute couture is tailored for one’s unique taste, this property’s success in realizing its listed price would most likely boil down to subjectivity, according to Miller.
Based on the available information so far, Miller believes this listing isn't aspirationally priced—where an owner splurges $20 million on a property, renovates it for $8 million then lists it for $100 million. “With the opportunity to get the developer’s help in reconfiguring and customizing the property prior to move-in, it’s possible that a potential owner would find the $250-million trophy price tag a good value for them,” he said.
