Weekly Roundup: Apartment bargains, price gains, sinking supply, mixed prognostications

Residential sales market attains highest peak in total dollars citywide since 2008 financial crisis, sales trail 2010

When it comes to the middle class, Manhattan naturally has one of its own

Winning design for micro-apartments allows for 55 250-to-370-sf modular units in Kips Bay

An UWS townhouse is listed for. . . $50 million

Closed sales in the Bronx slide to five-year low in 2012 as median inches up to $288,990

Major architecture firms expect 10-20 percent staff growth

First-floor apartment one of eight ways to get more space for less money

Zillow calculates 8.3 percent rise in home values

It is possible to avoid double taxation when refinancing in the city

If you can’t be too rich or thin, apparently you can have too much house

Average home price in the Hamptons sets record with surge of luxury sales

Sold price of Gramercy condop trimmed 67 percent from price that fashion designer had paid

Singer’s original $18 million asking price for Tribeca penthouse off key

It’s selling days

Weekly Roundup: All signs point to strengthening market in NYC and U.S., owners of luxury homes gild lillies, lighthouse in Chesapeake Bay for sale

Number of Manhattan properties under contract soars, inventory plummets during 2012

Q4 Brooklyn prices post biggest year-over-year price gain since 2006, while Queens median climbs 14 percent

Bars, restaurants and grocery stores can hurt quality of life, resales for residents of apartment buildings

Foreclosures mushroom in Queens, grow somewhat in Staten Island and the Bronx, slide in Brooklyn and Manhattan

Astronaut resists aiming for moon in putting Los Angeles condo on the market

Former baseball star lists sprawling Beverly Hills estate for $25 million

Actors who split in 2011 finally selling their UES triplex, for $9.25 million

TV judge lists Midtown pied-à-terre for $9 million — yes, for a pied-à-terre!

Estate of acerbic intellectual sells Chelsea penthouse to seven-time Emmy winner

Filmmaker offers Greenwich Village co-op for sale but plans no move to North Dakota

At 4.2 million, home sales

Weekly Roundup: Rent control, record low, rates, renovations, rosier forecasts. . . much more!

Three-year extension of rent control becomes law

Area single-family homes experience 2.9 percent drop over 12 months

South Bronx burns no more

Trulia says it’s cheaper to rent than buy in Queens

Selling condos to moms and dads often comes down to child’s play

Harlem’s renaissance enjoys revival

Following reports of rent scams by Queens man, attorney general issues Craigslist alert

NYU’s Furman Center documents plunge in

Rat Island goes for $176,000 at auction

From left, Red Brennan and winning bidders Alex and Noelva Schibli (c)

Rat Island, that inhospitable slab of rocks off City Island in the Bronx, sold at auction Sunday for $176,000 (including 10 percent buyer’s premium), becoming perhaps the first such sale in New York City for centuries.

“The last time was $26 to the Indians,” the seller, Edmund “Red” Brennan, 73, in Harley Davidson braces, quipped while waiting for the event to begin. He was, of course, referring to the purchase of the island of Manhattan.

Rat Island with prospective bidder Steven Heyman (right) and a family friend in the foreground (c)

The winning bidder was a City Island resident, Alex Schibli, 72, who frequently swims or kayaks to the improbably desirable slab of rocks.  With wife Noelva nodding approval, Shibli told me that he wants to keep Rat Island clear and natural for his family’s use.

There were were but two determined bidders once increments of $10,000 took the action above $50,000, the second one being a Westchester internist.

Auctioneer Jack Lyon, in white, urging the Schiblis to bid more. To the couple’s left, the man with the moustache dropped out of the bidding at the end. (c)

Under sunny skies, auctioneer Jack Lyon began the sale at 1:25 p.m. by inviting a $500,000 bid before rapidly de-escalating to $350,000, whereupon the physician offered $10,000.  When the number reached $100,000, Lyon called for a minute’s pause, as he had indicated he would do, and it was all over by 1:32 p.m.

Although the winning bid had been announced as subject to the owner’s approval, Shibli didn’t have to wait long to know whether Rat Island was his.

“It’s a done deal,” said Brennan, who had traveled to the city from his retirement home in Jupiter, Fla. for the auction and for a daughter’s wedding Saturday night.

(An earlier version of this post erroneously omitted addition of the 10 percent buyer’s premium in calculating the winning price.)

Next post: Out and About on Tuesday

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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

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You can buy your own New York City island

Own a piece of (the) rock. . . Rat Island.

Updated on 9/21 at end:

Off City Island in the Bronx, a New York City island called “Rat” can be yours at auction on Oct. 2.

The New York Daily News reported in 2009 that one Red Brennan, a 40-year marine contractor who salvaged barges and stored equipment there, was trying to unload the thing for $300,000.  Well, he failed in that effort.

The barren 2.5-acre Rat Island is to be sold at 1 p.m.

Bankruptcy auction set for 2BR Chelsea co-op

Living room of 101 W. 23rd St., Unit 3J, in Manhattan.

A two-bedroom, one-bath co-op in the heart of Chelsea is to be among the properties auctioned Aug. 4 starting at 11 a.m.

Other properties on the block include a single-family house in Pelham Gardens, the Bronx; a two-family residence in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn; and a two-family house in Springfield Gardens, Queens.

The renovated 950-sf Chelsea apartment,

The Big Apple: A 30-room co-op could be yours

High Line is proving to be an increasingly strong magnet for developers

With the next section of the elevated Chelsea park known as the High Line poised to open next month, New York developers are gearing up numerous projects along the route in hopes of capitalizing on rising interest in the area.

The High Line has helped transform an area that remains a long walk from public transportation, offers less retail than other downtown neighborhoods, and until recently was associated with crime and industrial blight.

The second section, which is slated to open sometime in June and will run from 20th Street to 30th Street, is a less-developed area but has already attracted new construction.

Even with $60 million for adjoining apartments, not just anyone can assume board approval in famed building

Two adjoining duplex apartments at a legendary Park Avenue address are about to be put on the market for $60 million.

The grand apartments on the 12th and 13th floors of

The Big Apple: Years of inventory? Much more!

Eight to 17 years is an S&P projection for clearing shadow inventory in the five boroughs

It will take more than a decade to clear up all the shadow inventory in the residential real estate market in New York state, according to new report released by Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services.

That is more than three times longer than it will take the rest of the nation, a difference that the report largely attributes to the greater time it takes to foreclose on a property in New York.

According to the report, shadow inventory in Brooklyn will take the longest to unwind at more than 17 years. Bronx was close behind at 16.5 years, and Staten Island recorded 12 years. Manhattan fared the best, coming in at a little more than eight years.

Unlisted Upper East Side home finds buyer for. . . $47 million

A grand East Side townhouse that has been quietly shopped by its owners for three years is under contract for more than $47 million, further evidence that the top-end of the Manhattan market is soaring.

The 33-foot-wide townhouse on East 69th Street once belonged to

The Big Apple: Prices double over 10 years. More!

10-YEAR REPORT DEMONSTRATES REBOUNDING MARKET FROM 2009 TO 2010

The 2010 Manhattan real estate market shows marked improvement from the doldrums of 2009, with prices twice as high as a decade ago, according to 10-year apartment and townhouse market reports.

The median sales price of Manhattan co-ops and condominiums in 2010 was

The Big Apple: Median price grew most here

My coverage of New York City news likely will be sporadic over the next couple of weeks, but please do check here to catch up with important developments or perhaps my idle musings.

BANKS STRUGGLE TO SEIZE HOMES, MORE SO IN NEW YORK THAN ANYWHERE ELSE

It takes longer to foreclose on homes in New York than in any other state—and it’s getting longer every month.

Two years ago, the state began requiring that banks and borrowers attend settlement conferences before a foreclosure takes place.

While the conferences are popular with borrowers and have succeeded in helping some families keep their homes, banks have been reluctant to participate. That, and recent revelations that some lenders have improperly submitted foreclosure documents, has prompted judges to take a harsher stance with lenders.

CUOMO IS UNRELENTING ON PLEDGE TO CAP PROPERTY TAXES

Gov.-elect Andrew M. Cuomo is making clear to legislative leaders that one of his priorities is to cap local property taxes, a notion that would have large consequences statewide for homeowners and school districts.

Take my refrigerator, please, as the eighth item below suggests. No, not YOU! (Flickr photo by Tammy Green)

Cuomo is proposing a limit on the total amount of property tax dollars that can be collected annually by a school district, municipality or special district by capping the increase in the local tax levy at 2 percent or the rate of inflation, whichever is less, according to his campaign literature.  Schools traditionally receive the largest share of property taxes.

A cap would not directly affect New York City, where property taxes are relatively low because of revenue from the city’s personal income tax and where the schools are financed through the general city budget. But outside the city, New York is among the most heavily taxed states in the country.

D’YA THINK THIS NOMAD MIGHT HAVE A BOOK OR MOVIE DEAL IN THE BACK OF HIS MIND OR HIGHEST OF HIS HOPES?

Ed Casabian’s nomadic existence