Out and About: Desperate measures warranted?

Truncated living room in an Upper West Side studio apartment.

Given the cost of residential real estate in Manhattan, nothing could be more understandable than buyers’ willingness to match the imperfect co-op or condo that they decide to purchase with the amount of money they can afford.

Consequently, many folks in search of a new home readily accept the necessity of turning a two-bedroom apartment into a three-bedroom unit, an alcove studio into a one-bedroom home.

But they invariably pay a price both in aesthetics and, paradoxically, flexibility.  Gone the dining area, the well-placed window in the living room, the airy ambiance.

So it is with

I told my buyers not to trust me unreservedly

If love is blind, trust should not be too.

It was time for my buyers to consider how much the essential renovations would run them in the event they wanted to make an offer for a two-bedroom apartment on the Upper West Side.

They asked in an e-mail what I thought the project might cost.  Herewith my response:

Agents don’t sell homes. Buyers do it themselves.

Bill Gassett

In no uncertain terms, Massachusetts real estate agent Bill Gassett declares in a post he wrote that “accompanied real estate showings do not sell homes.”

I am inclined to agree with him about the practice, in which the listing agent requires her or his presence when a buyer’s broker shows a property.  Says Gassett:

There is a long standing misconception amongst some people that Realtors “sell homes”. It may come as a surprise but

Out and About: What is the color of money?

View through kitchen into living room of Upper West Side condo.

Conventional wisdom has it that vivid colors can be an overwhelming obstacle to the sale of a residential property that is on the market.

Mostly the notion seems to hold true.  It is difficult, the argument goes, for prospective buyers to imagine themselves in a home that speaks too loudly of its sellers.

In fact, I recall one client of mine who rejected a house in suburban Washington, D.C. — solely, she said — because she hated the wall covering in the living room.  That sort of reaction happens more often than you might imagine.

But the well renovated apartment pictured here may defy the advice to tone down an apartment’s personality as expressed by bright colors.

Although I cannot imagine myself living with the palette chosen by the condo’s residents, I did find the place to be

Not all terms for home inspections are the same

Although home inspections are less common in New York City than elsewhere, they are essential in certain cases.

Sparing the expense of several hundred dollars, a buyer is particularly unwise to be pound foolish in the purchase of new apartment or single-family house, whether old or new.  Inspections are especially useful for with respect to apartments in small buildings, on top floors and on ground floors.

(The BrickUnderground Web site recently provided a helpful home inspection checklist.)

An important question facing prospective purchasers is how to achieve the inspection with maximum protection and minimum chance to have sellers reject their offers.

Because the time between making an offer and signing a binding contract easily can last one or two weeks here in New York, one approach

Co-ops in small buildings may face stormy seas

(Flickr photo by Steve Babb)

There are many advantages to buying a co-op in a small building, among them:

• Being well acquainted with your neighbors;
• Generally low maintenance fees;
• Scale that is desirable to many of its residents;
• Numerous opportunities to participate meaningfully as a volunteer in a diminutive community;
• Application procedures that may be less onerous than in larger buildings.

However, some buyers see the disadvantageous side of the coin:

Broker’s unsolicited offer can cost sellers money

Accepting an unsolicited offer can lead to regrets. (Flickr photo by Muhammad Taslim Rasin)

Some brokers faced with tight inventory have been reaching out to owners of properties that are not listed for sale in an effort to meet their buyers’ needs.

I admire their enterprise, but consider the implications for a seller who decides to entertain an unsolicited purchase offer.

First, they have to conclude whether they need professional assistance to evaluate the offer and the buyer.  If they depend on the buyer’s representative, however, they have to confront the issue of divided loyalty in likely a dual agency arrangement.

Should such sellers decide to

First-timers often focus fears on wrong questions

The only thing buyers need fear is fear itself. (Flickr photo by juanpg)

It is a fear that I have a felt myself: Buying real estate is scary.

However much anxiety that the process plagues first-timers, the fear seems to all but disappear with subsequent purchases.

Although it is incumbent on any buyer to assess the risk, it also is true that

Out and About: Round really rocks on market

This 400-sf room commands the center of $5.45 million condo on the Upper West Side.

It is fair to say that buyers entering a round room unfailingly fall in love with the place.

Rooms evocative of Repunzel in her tower possess far more allure than, say, Sub-Zero refrigerators, palatial master bedroom suites, wood-burning fireplaces and views to die for.

Forget about cookie cuttters when the very novelty of a round room can excite envy, generate conversation and embrace all who enter there.  They seem to define difference that only excessive amounts of money can buy.

Conversely, rooms with sharply angled corners may look interesting only on paper.

The round room in this 2BR condo on Central Park West covers 1,100 square, and its diameter extends 37 feet.  Most recent asking price: $2.995 million.

That’s because odd-shaped rooms that aren’t round tend to call attention to defective layouts.  They seem squeezed into a residence, sometimes suggesting charm while raising questions simultaneously, often subconsciously, about compromises that an architect had to make.

What I’ve noticed about round rooms is that they rarely are found in new buildings; they tend to be features of very old buildings encrusted with carved ornamentation.

A round room that I saw in an intriguing apartment in the low 70s off Broadway got me going on the subject.  That it had a bath of singular angularity was a bonus, but I couldn’t photograph it well enough to demonstrate the odd shape.

In any case, the 2,800-sf condo is the combination of three units, and the layout evokes that past.  Designed around a light well, the apartment has one long hall. off of which are a half bath and laundry; a fourth bedroom accessed via a room used as a library; a semicircular bath off that bedroom; a top-end open kitchen that also is semicircular (hemispherical?); a large dining area opposite the kitchen; and an unforgettable “great room” that is 20 feet in diameter.

There are three soundless windows overlooking Broadway in the low 70s from about halfway up the distinguished 1904 building, central air conditioning and a sprawling master bedroom suite with a big dressing area lined with clothes leading to a triangular walk-in closet.

It is a memorable apartment.  So, too, is the price: $5.45 million with common charges of $3,530 and real estate taxes of $1,639 a month.  And that proved to be no deterrence to one buyer; the place already is under contract.

Below are some of the other properties that other brokers have listed and that I visited prior to my travels overseas:

• On West End Avenue in the mid 90s, a one-bedroom co-op with only courtyard views from the living room.  However, the bedroom of this 600-sf apartment has largely open exposures west.  Closet space is minimal, the condition is good, and the galley kitchen is tiny and dated, containing appliances that are approximately half-size.  In a pet-friendly 1935 low-rise with few amenities, the unit is offered at an appropriately reduced $379,000 with monthly maintenance of $916.
• An expansive one-bedroom apartment on a Central Park block in the mid 60s.  With a balcony (unfortunately) accessed through the bedroom, this apartment in a full-service 1969 high-rise with numerous amenities has a modest interior kitchen, decent bath, generous closet space and ceilings of standard height.  Its asking price of $930,000 with maintenance per month of $1,080 is within range of comparable sales in the building, so it found a buyer in three weeks.
• In the high 80s just east of Amsterdam Avenue, a well-priced three-bedroom co-op with perfectly acceptable maid’s room.  There are three baths that pleasantly combine old and new features, modern galley kitchen with GE Profile appliances and merely decent cabinets, mostly open exposures west from three rooms, a good-size dining area between the foyer and everything else, fresh paint, nicely refinished floors and welcoming entry.  In a pet-friendly 1983 doorman building, this corner apartment should sell not far below its asking price of $1.75 million with monthly maintenance of $2,995.  In this sellers’ market, thus unit, too, was gone within three weeks.
• A beautifully renovated two-bedroom apartment flooded with sun from the south on a lower floor of in Morningside Heights east of Broadway.  With modern, albeit narrow, galley kitchen, gleamingly refinished floors and rooms of pre-war proportions, this co-op in a permissive 1909 building that has a doorman, roof deck and gym is well priced at $799,000 with monthly maintenance of $1,288.  And yes, it went to contract in a mere month.

Tomorrow: Luxury condo at auction

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Malcolm Carter
Licensed Associate Real Estate Broker
Senior Vice President
Charles Rutenberg Realty
127 E. 56th Street
New York, NY 10022

M: 347-886-0248
F: 347-438-3201

Malcolm@ServiceYouCanTrust.com
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Buyers need to get truly organized as they search

Your own spreadsheet doesn’t have to be as complex as this one. (flickr photo by Ivan Walsh)

The search for a new home can be fun. But it also can be frustrating, exhausting and confusing.

To emphasize fun, the wise course is to get as organized as possible. That is the case even if you are the sort of person who values spontaneity, impulsiveness and instinctive decision-making above all.

One useful approach is to assemble a loose-leaf notebook or its electronic equivalent.

Begin by