by JULIE SATOW, The New York Times, March 20, 2014
The developers of 215 Sullivan Street in the Village promote its “lushly landscaped backyard”.
Photo: Watson & Company
Source: www.nytimes.com
After a seemingly endless winter, the first hints of spring have teased us with a day or two of temperatures over 60 degrees. That fleeting glimpse of warmth sent many New Yorkers flying out of doors to enjoy the sunshine. For my part, I sipped my morning coffee at home last week and stared wistfully out the window at a neighbor’s balcony.
In our concrete jungle, there is a hefty dollar value attached to having your own garden oasis — even the smallest of shrubberies carries a price tag. And with so many residents suffering from a vitamin D deficiency these days, brokers are promoting listings that can claim specks of green, even if they’re barely large enough to hold a bonsai.
Yet there are some listings for which the warmer weather was made.
Downtown, the average price of a luxury condominium with a terrace is $8.3 million; that compares with just $6 million for those without terraces, according to Vanderbilt Appraisal. And developers are doing whatever they can to take advantage of that pricing edge.
The building at 56 Leonard Street in TriBeCa, for example, is a series of stacked boxes designed to allow nearly every unit an outdoor space. In the West Village, the developer of 150 Charles Street created several setbacks that feature enviable terraces. And at Walker Tower, the Chelsea conversion where prices have broken several downtown records, a unit that has a terrace is selling for a premium of more than 40 percent over comparable apartments without outdoor space, according to Vanderbilt.
The demand for outdoor space has grown so strong that in some instances, prices have exceeded the industry rule of thumb, which places outdoor space at 20 percent to 50 percent of the price of the interior square footage. Some terraces are trading for as much per square foot as the interior space, or even more. […]
See also:
200 East 79th Street
215 Sullivan Street