I was having lunch yesterday with customers with whom I have worked for over a year, and we are now happily in contract for an apartment that makes them feel good just spending time in it (even if the reason we are in it is to meet with contractors to plan a lengthy renovation!). While talking to them about our process (and about the course yet to come of selling their current apartment), they mentioned that they had been surprised at how many aspects of the journey I had been able to help them with, not just the obvious ones of sending them listings, making appointments to see apartments, negotiating the terms of their offer, etc. It occurred to me that I have never stated something that I feel strongly: I want to be your resource for real estate in NYC, and for so much more as well. There is never any obligation to ask me a question for yourself, or for a friend or family member, and I love doing it. Here are some examples of issues I have dealt with/ questions I have answered for people before, some of whom go on to become customers, and others who might become so in the future, but are not currently:
Questions about the market: How’s the coop versus condo market? What are interest rates likely to do and how will that affect sales? What generally happens to the real estate market during an election year?
Questions about value: What is my apartment worth? Can I get an apartment in another neighborhood with more space/light/quiet for the same price I am currently paying/for what my apartment is worth? Can I buy an apartment for approximately the same monthly costs as I am currently paying in rent?
Questions about neighborhoods: What area of NYC is a possible value play these days? How is X neighborhood evolving?
Questions about investing: What are the value neighborhoods where an apartment would be rented quickly and profitably? Does it makes sense for me to buy an apartment for my student or young adult to live in? What kind of appreciation might I get if I keep the apartment for X years?
Questions about other professionals: Do you know a good real estate lawyer/accountant/insurance agent/mortgage broker/interior designer/contractor/stager/housekeeper/moving company/dog walker/pet groomer? (Answer:Yes!)
Questions about new development: What’s going on in the super-luxury market? How do new development sales affect/relate to traditional coop sales? Are there any new developments in X neighborhood/for X price point?
Questions about moving/relocation: Can I get a rental/buy a coop or condo if I don’t have a green card/visa? Can I use an out-of-town guarantor? How I can set up a bank account in the US before I move? Can I wire money to my lawyer and have her bring the funds for my condo at closing? How do I set up with Con Ed/Verizon/Time Warner?
Questions about dealing with a landlord/coop or condo board: How can I go about getting an alteration agreement approved? Is my landlord required to get rid of the rats? (Note: this question came to me while on vacation from the panic-struck out-of-state friend of a customer, whose daughter was a new renter in the city!)
Questions about timing: What is the best time to look for a rental? What is the best time to put my apartment on the market if I choose to do so? How does the outdoor space in my apartment affect when it might best sell?
Questions about living in the city: How do you handle deliveries in a non-doorman building? Will Seamless/Fresh Direct/Ikea deliver to a fifth-floor walk-up? What are the recycling rules? How can I get tickets to Hamilton/discount tickets to other shows? How does Citibike work?
These are just samples of the many types of questions I have been able to answer in the past. Let me say again – none of these questions obligate you in any way! Of course, if you are looking to buy or sell, I would like you to give me a chance to explain what I can do for you, but I do genuinely love being a resource without any expectation in return. One more thing, when preparing a package of information to give potentials sellers last week (I do have the exclusive on their apartment now, and it will hit the market next month), I was struck again by the Corcoran mission statement (shown below) and how perfectly it dovetails with my own standard of behavior as a real estate agent. I have been told on more than one occasion that I “don’t seem like a real estate agent” to which I reply, “If I had to be the kind of real estate agent you are referring to, I wouldn’t be in this business.” Luckily for me, Corcoran supports my own desire to put the customer, not the payday, front and center of every decision, and to provide exceptional service.
Just as the larger neighborhood known as the Upper East Side has many smaller neighborhoods within it, such as Yorkville, Carnegie Hill,Lenox Hill (yes, lots of hills on the UES!), the Upper West Side – on the opposite side of Central Park – also has subdivisions. Recently I have had two customers interested in looking for homes in the area of the UWS known as Lincoln Square, the southeast corner of the neighborhood – roughly bounded by Central Park West and Amsterdam Avenue to the east and west, and 59th to 66th Streets to the south and north. Interestingly enough, the area was characterized in 1940 as the “worst slum in New York City” by the New York Housing Authority, and the urban renewal efforts in the 1950’s and 1960’s led to the development of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. This anchored the residential redevelopment of the area into the vibrant neighborhood it is now.
As I have written before, my favorite way to experience a neighborhood is by taking an unplanned walk within the area (a dérive), so on an overcast but not terribly cold February day, I started at Columbus Circle and began my stroll.
At Columbus Circle, you stand at the intersection of the Upper West Side, Central Park, and Midtown West. The shops at Columbus Circle house a Whole Foods as well as specialty stores and Jazz at Lincoln Center.
Turning around to look at Central Park for a moment . . .
Just north of the statue of Columbus, a subway hub that can get you quickly to virtually any location in the city.
Walking north a few block on Central Park West, I can’t resist stopping to admire 15 Central Park West, a phenomenally successful building on so many different levels – a classic limestone two-towered building that looks as though it could have always been there, but simultaneously a new development from 2007 with prices per square foot averaging well over $5000 per square foot. I greatly enjoyed reading Michael Gross’s recent book about the development of the site, House of Outrageous Fortune.
Walking west on W. 61st Street, you can see a side entrance to 15 CPW. On the W. 62nd Street side, there is a lovely garden.
This part of the Upper West Side can be a little confusing, in that Broadway is the next Avenue you come to after Central Park West, while for much of the neighborhood the park block is between CPW and Columbus. Broadway, transecting the length of Manhattan on a diagonal, disrupts the orderly grid of most of Manhattan above 14th Street, creating “squares” – really triangles – as it cuts across the orderly boulevards. Union Square, Madison Square Park, Herald Square, and Times Square are all the result of Broadway’s slow progress from west to east as it heads south in Manhattan, and Lincoln Square is yet another. Walking up Broadway to W. 63rd, I headed west again to see Lincoln Square itself, namesake for this neighborhood.
Just south of Lincoln Square is the Empire Hotel, whose sign is a local landmark, and P.J. Clarke’s, a cozy yet upscale place to sit and have a nice meal.
Obviously a strong selling point for the neighborhood is the proximity to Lincoln Center, and the ease of attending performances of opera, music, ballet, theatre, and even the Big Apple Circus in the fall of each year.
The Julliard School, just north of Lincoln Center, also offers high quality student performances.
Looking east while standing in front of Julliard, I noticed the Mormon Visitor Center, best known to me as the place where Hannah and Harper volunteer in Tony Kushner’s epic play, “Angels in America.”
Just north of Julliard is Alice Tully Hall, home to more intimate concerts than those in much larger Avery Fisher Hall (newly renamed David Geffen Hall).
Turning east again on West 66th St., I walked past ABC studios on the way back to Central Park. Just a few blocks north of this intersection is the Loews Lincoln Square Cineplex. I really love this as an option for seeing popular movies, as each individual theatre has the name and style of an old-time movie palace, making the experience there have a little more personality than many multiplexes.
Ending up in Central Park at 66th, yet another advantage to this neighborhood is its proximity to Tavern on the Green, renovated a few years ago but with the twinkling outside fairy lights remaining.
So what does it cost to live in Lincoln Square? As with any neighborhood, it varies greatly depending on the building, but average prices are just under $3000/square foot, compared to just over $2000/square foot for all of the Upper West Side (averaging prices of the far northern sections of the UWS with those to the south, of course). Central Park South, just to the south and east of Lincoln Square averages $5000/square foot, in part because of the premium associated with apartments with views of the park. Lincoln Square tends to be newer buildings, mostly condos, compared to the largely prewar coop inventory of most of the UWS.
In my opinion, the location of Lincoln Square is unparalleled – at the intersection of the Upper West Side, Midtown West, and with Central Park as a virtual front yard.
One of my favorite things about being a real estate agent in New York City is being able to move around all neighborhoods within the city. For so many people, we spend time around our place of work and around our home – but for me, the entire city is my place of work! NYC is endlessly changing and never boring, but I believe that at no point during the calendar year does it shine as brightly as December. We humans have been so clever, creating repetitive rituals that specifically call for light just as we hit the darkest time of the year. This December we have had unusually warm weather, and no snow, but the holiday decorations have proceeded full force. The following is a selection of some of 2015’s holiday decorations, taken in various neighborhoods in the city.
The grand dame of the city’s holiday scene is certainly the tree at Rockefeller Center. Although they manage to find an impressively large and full tree every year, to my mind the tree itself is not what makes this such an iconic spot – it’s the framing device. Towering 30 Rock behind the tree, Prometheus and skaters beneath it, wind-whipped flags surrounding it, and heralding angels leading the viewer from Fifth Avenue toward the tree – it just doesn’t get better than that. I would advise you go early in the season or very early or late at night to avoid intense crowds that take away the awe and replace it with claustrophobia.
If in the Rockefeller Center area, the light and music display on the front of Saks Fifth Avenue just across the street is worth waiting a bit for. Every 10 minutes from about 4-11 PM, the building is transformed into “The Winter Palace” using over 225,000 lights and a synchronized soundtrack.
If you are fortunate enough to be able to catch the Radio City show, expect to be overwhelmed with Art Deco holiday lusciousness. Even if outside the Music Hall, you can appreciate the elaborate decorations.
I particularly enjoyed the Peanuts-themed decorations outside Macy’s this year.
Inside Macy’s, they have created a beautiful but somewhat whimsical lighted forest, including animatronic squirrels.
Barneys is continuing to develop upon its ice theme from last year (live ice skaters performed on ice in the windows in 2014) with ice sculptures being created in real time in one of its windows (starting around noon every day). I found it amusing that, rather than carols, Foreigner’s “Cold as Ice” plays regularly as the artist works his magic in the chilled chamber.
The holiday markets that spring up all over the city every year are wonderful – food, crafts, and atmosphere. A particular favorite of mine is in Union Square.
The Bryant Park holiday market has the advantage of surrounding the tree and ice skating rink (free!), with the additional possibility of heading around the front of the NY Public Library to see the great stone lions Patience and Fortitude, majestic and wreathed.
The holiday market at Columbus Circle puts you right at the Southwest corner of Central Park.
Across the street from that holiday market at the shops at Columbus Circle, with a beautiful snowflake light and sound show running almost continually.
The city’s museums share in the holiday spirit, with the American Museum of Natural History presenting topiary dinosaurs with wreaths and tiny white lights. Inside, they have a tree covered in origami art.
Somewhat more seriously, the Metropolitan Museum of Art across the park presents the Neopolitan tree inside the Medieval Sculpture Hall with exquisitely carved figures, angels ascending, and seasonal music.
While on the Upper East Side, be sure to see the Park Avenue mall with its majestic line of trees from the base of the MetLife building all the way up to 96th Street.
Some of my favorite decorations are those you come across while walking through different neighborhoods. From a simple menorah or tree glimpsed in a window to elaborate townhouse decorations like those pictured above, even familiar blocks can reveal surprises at this time of the year. When I see personal decorations, for one moment I feel a connection with the person who took the time to send some light into this dark time of the year (often dark for some personally or for the world, in addition to the shortening days), my neighbors in this wonderful city.
For previous blog posts about this season, click here and here .
Bust of Alexander Hamilton, flanked by portraits of Aaron and Theodosia Burr, in the New York Historical Society
In the incomparable new American musical, Hamilton, currently the hottest ticket on Broadway in New York City at the Richard Rodgers theatre, the Schuyler sisters are introduced to the audience as they sing joyfully about living in the “greatest city in the world.” This is my own bias as well, and I do consider myself to be “so lucky to be alive right now” and living in NYC. However, as a real estate agent, I know that being able to live in the city is often a struggle – quite often financially in terms of being able to afford living here, and even for those with the means, difficult in terms of limited inventory. Because of my love for the city, and my day-to-day immersion in the city’s residential real estate market, I have found myself thinking about the different neighborhoods mentioned in Hamilton in terms of real estate availability and value. I have already blogged about many of these areas in terms of taking a dérive, or an unplanned walk in an urban environment (see my initial explanation about this idea here), and I will link to those posts when possible.
Before getting into the fun stuff, a few technical notes about price per square foot measures mentioned below: All stats on sales price per square foot are from the Real Estate Board of New York’s third quarter 2015 report here. Condos and coops are listed separately, as the comparative ease of buying a condo versus a coop is reflected in generally higher prices for condos (20-25% more per square foot). Also, higher prices for condos often reflect differences in types of housing – newer developments tend to be condos. For reference, I will also mention current average listing prices found on streeteasy.com for the different neighborhoods, but keep in mind that listing price averages are always higher than closed sales averages, since half or more of all listings end up selling for less than asking price. Also, I am focusing on sales, although I may mention rentals in each neighborhood as well.
Financial District
When the Schuyler sisters sing about living in “Manhattan,” the area we now know as the Financial District (see my previous blog post here) was almost entirely the area considered to be the city at that time. This is quite fitting, since the Financial District as a business center and home to Wall Street owes a great deal to Alexander Hamilton, who as first Secretary of the Treasury provided much of the foundation for NYC as the financial powerhouse it is today. However, over time, the fashionable residential areas spread north, and this area as a residential neighborhood has only returned in force over the past 10-12 years. Walking these streets is an exciting mix between reminders of our colonial and revolutionary past, and the very new and modern development that is occurring now and transforming the neighborhood.
When Hamilton, Laurens, Lafayette, and Mulligan sing “The Story of Tonight” while drinking in a pub, it might well have been the Fraunces Tavern, since the Sons of Liberty (of which Hercules Mulligan was a member) met there and it was a popular pub at the time. George Washington gave his farewell address to his officers at Fraunces Tavern in 1783. From there, you are a short walk to New York Harbor where Hamilton stole the British cannons at the Battery (as described in “Right Hand Man”), or Trinity Church, where Alexander and Eliza Hamilton are buried near Eliza’s sister Angelica.
How affordable is the Financial District (F.D.)? All city prices would seem unbelievable to those living here at the time of the American Revolution, but for downtown Manhattan, it is relatively affordable. The most recent REBNY numbers showed condos in the F.D. averaging $1207 per square foot (compared to $1593 overall for all of Manhattan, and nearby areas Soho at $2021 and the West Village at $2323 much higher per square foot). Coops average $906 per square foot in the F.D. (compared to $1218 for all of Manhattan, $1509 for Soho, and $1629 for the West Village). I recently did a rental search for a friend wanting to move from Tribeca, and showed her that she could either save about a third in rent if she kept the same size and quality of apartment, or get another bedroom for about the same price or even a little less.
Hell’s Kitchen
Yes, you can call it Clinton if you like, but I think the name “Hell’s Kitchen” is one of the coolest in all of New York City and when I move there I will state the name proudly. No, this area is not mentioned in the musical Hamilton and in fact would not have been populated much at all at the time, but it is very near the Richard Rodgers theatre, currently the home to the musical. The proximity to the theatre district keeps prices down a bit, but would be a plus to me (see my previous blog post about Times Square and Hell’s Kitchen here). There are blocks in Hell’s Kitchen that look just like quiet leafy Chelsea blocks – but at a fraction of the cost – as well as new condo high rises with every amenity and the prices to match.
The REBNY report is for Midtown West, which encompasses a bit more than just Hell’s Kitchen, but lists the average price per square foot at $1734 for condos and $1230 for coops.
Stage door at the Richard Rodgers
The Upper East Side
Statue of Alexander Hamilton in Central Park
Again, not mentioned in Hamilton (although a family with the wealth and connections of the Schuylers would have certainly moved to Fifth Avenue along with the robber barons in the early 20th century), but mentioned because of the statue of Alexander Hamilton standing proudly among the trees behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in our beloved Central Park (not created until long after Revolutionary times).
The Upper East Side has long been a bastion of wealth, and areas to the west of Lexington Avenue still command a premium due to proximity to Central Park (see one of my many blog posts about the park here, and another about the value of a park view here). However, the far east side (east of Second Avenue, particularly the area called Yorkville, see my post here) still has value, in part because of its perceived remoteness and the construction mess due to the building of the Second Avenue Subway. While overall the Upper East Side averages $1764 per square foot for condos and $1234 for coops, Streeteasy listings show the difference in listing prices for Yorkville ($1693 per square foot, all types) versus Lenox Hill near the park ($2667 per square foot, all types). Rentals in Yorkville are particularly well priced compared to other areas of Manhattan, except for areas of upper Manhattan that will be discussed next.
Harlem and Upper Manhattan
There are plenty of references to Harlem in Hamilton, from Washington’s “run to Harlem quick” in “Right Hand Man, ” Hamilton’s wooing of Eliza with a plan to “get a little place in Harlem and we’ll figure it out” in “Helpless,” and “the Hamiltons move uptown” in “It’s Quiet Uptown.” Moving to Harlem in those days before motorized vehicles and the subway was the equivalent to moving to the remote countryside, and even King’s College (later renamed Columbia, sorry again, King George) was at that time in lower Manhattan, not in its current spot in Morningside Heights (see a previous blog post here). Hamilton Heights, an area of Harlem I wrote about in this blog post, is named for the location of Hamilton Grange, and the Hamilton home can still be seen there (although not in the exact location, still within the farmland owned by the Hamiltons). Even farther north than Harlem is Washington Heights (see previous blog post here), home of the Morris-Jumel mansion – once Washington’s headquarters (and then the British government’s), later the home of Aaron Burr, and most recently the site used by Lin-Manuel Miranda to work on composing Hamilton. This historic home hosted many other notable figures who also live on in the musical by reference or as characters – John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and yes, Alexander Hamilton.
Harlem and much of upper Manhattan is rapidly appreciating in value, but still represents a relative bargain in Manhattan. The REBNY numbers separate Harlem only by East ($748 per square foot for condos, no figures for coops) and West ($713 for condos, $996 for coops), not a very practical demarcation. Streeteasy listings show average prices as $829 per square foot for trendy Central Harlem (all types), $667 for East Harlem, $661 for Hamilton Heights, $721 for Morningside Heights (the Columbia effect), and $638 for Washington Heights.
There are other areas in NYC mentioned in Hamilton, some vague (“British take Brooklyn” in “Right Hand Man” – likely Brooklyn Heights) and others specific (“abandoning Kips’ Bay,” also in “Right Hand Man”) and those will be future places for my dérives and the subsequent blog posts.
At a recent social event, a friend and I were talking about getting together more often, and I said, “Well, you know how to find me.” Her husband responded, “Yes, at the Hamilton lottery!” (clearly he is following my Facebook posts) and my friend asked what the show was about. After explaining that it is a hip-hop musical based on the life of Alexander Hamilton, and she replied, “You know, that sounds like the craziest thing I have ever heard!” Well, crazy good . . . Yes, finding a place to live in New York City is frustrating, you will always end up spending more than you hoped (even those with more financial resources but especially those with fewer), and it will likely take longer than you want and you will end up compromising, but how lucky we are to be alive right now, in a city filled with creativity and the arts – truly, the greatest city in the world.
Walking to show two apartments in the 400 block of East 52nd (not in the actual building Greta Garbo lived in for decades, but the same block), I was struck by the nomenclature “Turtle Bay” for the area (roughly from 42nd Street to 53rd Street, from Lexington Avenue to the East River) and vowed to find out whether there had in fact been turtles in a bay here a long time ago. What I discovered was one of those funny mistranslations that sometimes occurs: the Dutch called this area “Deutal” (Knife) Bay after a sharp turn in the East River (the reason why York Avenue/Sutton Place disappears at 54th Street) but the English-speaking later settlers misheard it as “Turtle.” My interest piqued, I decided to take my next dérive (an unplanned walk in an urban environment) in this area.
Initially farmland (including that of the Beekman family, who gave their name to Beekman Place), Turtle Bay evolved into an industrial neighborhood, noted particularly for its slaughterhouses. In the early 20th Century, Charlotte Hunnewell Sorchan bought and renovated a series of houses in the area, and sold to friends, including Maria Bowen Chapin, who founded the Chapin School. This began the evolution of Turtle Bay into a residential neighborhood, which was cemented when the last of the slaughterhouses was torn down to make way for the United Nations building.
I began my dérive at my favorite skyscraper in New York City, the Chrysler Building. Finished in 1930, it was the world’s tallest skyscraper for 11 months before being ousted by the Empire State Building, and is still the world’s tallest brick building (although it does have a steel skeleton). An Art Deco masterpiece, to me it has an airy fairy-castle quality that contrasts markedly with the more aggressive forms of most NYC skyscrapers.
Walking east on 42nd Street, the distinctive Tudor City sign dominates the eastern view. The first residential skyscraper complex in the world, it was built in the 1920’s by a real estate developer with dreams of keeping middle-class people in the city rather than taking flight to the suburbs. Despite the name “Tudor,” the architecture is neo-Gothic in style. Most of the apartments face away from the East River, since when they were built the slaughterhouses, and their accompanying smell, still operated along the river. Many Tudor City apartments have wonderful views of the Chrysler and Empire State Buildings, but few face the United Nations for this reason.
Taking a set of steps down from Tudor City to First Avenue, the United Nations (as well as multiple diplomatic missions) now dominates the area of Turtle Bay between First Avenue and the East River. Established after World War II to promote cooperation between the nations of the world and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001, the organization is imperfect but the quote across the street from the UN from Isaiah (“ . . . neither shall they learn war any more”) reveals the hope behind creating such an assembly. On a lighter note, I remember my young daughters once asking where aliens would land on earth if they were to try to reach the “leader” and I said it would have to be Manhattan because of the UN. Whether this was good news or bad news to them, I will have to ask and find out.
Continuing north on First from the UN, I passed Mitchell Place, one of New York’s micro-streets (comprising just one block between First and Beekman Place, next to E. 49th Street). Turning west on 49th Street, I thought of E.B. White writing Charlotte’s Web in this neighborhood (he was living on E. 48th at the time) and stopped to admire the signage for “Katharine Hepburn Place” on the corner of Second and 49th). She lived in a beautiful townhouse between Third and Second on 49th Street for most of her adult life, and that block is a gracious quiet row of townhouses.
Turtle Bay, unlike some more cohesive neighborhoods in NYC, has a wide variety of experiences represented: from the bustle of the shops and restaurants along the Avenues, to the quiet of Beekman Place, or from the gardens of Tudor City surrounded by neo-Gothic residences, to the international nexus of the United Nations. It is, however, a place where it is possible to find an apartment on a dead-end block with little to no traffic noise, but only a few blocks from everything midtown Manhattan has to offer.
Recently I was at the Association for International Photography Art Dealers (AIPAD) show at the Park Avenue Armory. The abundance, diversity, and quality of the art shown in one space almost created a feeling of sensory overload, and I started to think about how thrilling it is to be in any place where the creative impulse is expressed by people, whether it be visual art, theater, dance, music, or architecture and design. The need for creative expression is fundamental to how we see ourselves as humans – the recognition we feel when we view the cave paintings from Paleolithic people living 40,000 years ago in Lascaux, France, emotionally spans the gap in time between us and them.
After leaving AIPAD, my thoughts turned to how we express our creativity when it comes to where we live. It might be a more efficient use of valuable real estate space to have every building in Manhattan exactly the same, with apartments only differing in how much space and how many rooms someone needed (and perhaps whether or not you felt the need for a doorman). The gables, terracotta ornaments, and decorative gargoyles at the Dakota (seen above) have no practical purpose. However, we all instinctively recoil when imagining Manhattan as a series of uniform buildings, neighborhoods identifiable only by street names as boundaries, not because you see the San Remo or a series of cast iron buildings. Rather than selecting an apartment near our workplace, many of us choose to live instead in neighborhoods farther away that express who we are as a human being. A person walking through the Art Deco lobby of the Century on Central Park West on the way to their apartment is surrounded by an esthetic that fits their own, and that is different but no less personally valid than that of someone entering their loft in Metal Shutter Houses in West Chelsea.
Real estate involves money and can be thought of as an investment, but unless you are buying solely to invest, the choice of what apartment you decide to live in speaks to so much more than a rational financial decision. We as humans need to express ourselves creatively, and we do so when we decide only to look at pre-war apartments with working fireplaces and moldings, or only on the Upper West Side park block with a terrace, or only downtown in a modern building with a view of the High Line. A good real estate agent will listen to what you want in the way that a search engine cannot. You can run a search for a two bedroom/ two bathroom apartment in a certain price range in a certain neighborhood and come up with some possibilities, or a good agent can listen to the creative desires being expressed and select apartments that are an excellent place to start looking. Sometimes you may even be introduced to a new neighborhood that you didn’t initially consider but that the agent thought you might like, based on what kind of apartment, and building, and neighborhood, you are looking for.
Pablo Picasso once said, “The purpose of art is washing the dust of our daily lives off our souls.” I can’t imagine a better way to wash this daily life debris off our souls than returning at the end of our day to a home that reflects our own sense of what is beautiful, from the external architecture of our building to the layout and décor of our personal space.
How much would you expect to pay for an iconic boat ride with spectacular views of lower Manhattan, Ellis Island, and the Statue of Liberty? If you want to pay, there are vendors who will allow you to do that, but a ride on the Staten Island Ferry, which delivers those views roughly every 30 minutes (more often during rush hours) throughout every day and night of the year, is entirely free. Twenty-one million people take this trip every year, and most are residents of Staten Island, which may be the borough in New York City most likely to fly under the radar. Whether you take the ferry ride to explore Staten Island as a potential home within the city, are a visitor to NYC looking for fantastic photo ops, or are a New Yorker with the need to experience the sensation of feeling a sea breeze blow past your face as a boat sways under your feet, this bargain experience is not to be missed.
For my trip on the ferry, I began by emerging from the Battery Park subway stop and walking a block or so to the Whitehall Terminal. Redesigned in 2005, the terminal is bright and airy – I particularly like the quotes on the walls by Edna St. Vincent Millay (“We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry”). There aren’t too many places to eat at this terminal, but there are benches and restrooms, and it’s very easy to figure out when the next ferry is coming and from which area you will embark.
Walking onto the ferry, if you are looking for photo ops of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, head up the stairs (the windows on the lower level are foggy) and go outside, to the right of the ferry as you enter. As the ferry pulls away, look behind you for fantastic views of lower Manhattan. If you happen to instead be on the left side of the ferry, you will also get views of the East River and the bridges – most famously, the Brooklyn Bridge – connecting Manhattan to Brooklyn. On the right side of the ferry, however, are the views most people are on the ferry to appreciate.
First you can see Ellis Island, processing center for scores of immigrants entering the United States, now a museum celebrating the immigrant experience and contribution to American life. Continuing on from Ellis Island is the symbol that represents New York, and in a larger sense, the United States, to so many: the Statue of Liberty. A gift from France (its official name is La Liberté éclairant le monde, or Liberty enlightening the world), this statue (actually much closer to New Jersey than to New York!) is described in Emma Lazarus’ famous poem as one that “glows world-side welcome” to immigrants all over the world. Whether that has always been the case or not, it is certainly a noble and aspirational sentiment for this ultimate melting-pot city.
Approaching Staten Island’s St. George ferry terminal, the 5.2 mile, 25 minute ride slows as the boat docks, giving one a great opportunity to photograph the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, connecting Brooklyn to Staten Island. It is almost impossible to catch the next ferry immediately (and you are required to get off the boat and re-enter), so consider having a bite to eat in the terminal. Staten Island is best accessed by car, so without one (and they aren’t allowed on the ferry any more) there isn’t much to do or see outside the terminal itself.
When making the trip back, go to the opposite side of the ferry to see what you missed on the way over. The Staten Island Ferry is featured on so many TV shows and movies (“Sex in the City” and “Working Girl” as examples) that you feel a bit like an extra on a TV or film shoot while feeling the breeze blow your hair with such iconic views to be seen. New York City can be an expensive place, but the Staten Island Ferry is one of the few classic city experiences that only costs you a few hours of your time.
Recently I was fortunate enough to see the new musical “Hamilton” at the Public Theater (arriving on Broadway this summer), leading me to my last blog post – a walk through Hamilton Heights, the neighborhood in upper Manhattan where Alexander Hamilton had farmland and lived in his final two years. However, much of Alexander Hamilton’s time in the city was spent in the area now known as the Financial District. Roughly occupying the same space as the original settlement of New Amsterdam, it lies at the very southernmost point of Manhattan, below City Hall Park, excluding the areas of Battery Park and Battery Park City. This neighborhood is a unique mixture of very old (the colonial remnants of New Amsterdam) and very new (it’s only recently become a popular choice as a residential neighborhood and new development buildings abound). With these thoughts in mind, I decided to take my next unplanned walk in an urban environment (a dérive) in the Financial District.
I emerged from the subway at Bowling Green, the traditional starting point of ticket tape parades up Broadway. This tradition with a spontaneous parade associated with the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886, and since has continued with celebrants as diverse as Theodore Roosevelt (upon his return from safari in Africa in 1910), Albert Einstein in the 1920’s, Charles Lindbergh as well as Amelia Earhart following their successful solo trans-Atlantic flights, Jesse Owens after winning four Olympic gold medals in 1936, the pianist Van Cliburn in 1958, the Apollo 11 astronauts, and the New York Yankees (nine times).
Wandering from Battery Park to State Street and on to Pearl Street, I came across what is possibly Manhattan’s oldest building (from 1719), Fraunces Tavern. This building is now a museum and restaurant as well as a National Historic Landmark. Once the meeting place of the secret society the Sons of Liberty, it became the headquarters for General George Washington at one point during the Revolution, and is where he gave his famous farewell address to his officers.
Continuing north on Broad Street, as I approached the intersection with Wall Street it was impossible to miss the imposing façade of the New York Stock Exchange. The roots of this center of American finance go back as far as the years immediately following the Revolution, and the earliest securities traded were War Bonds and stock from the First Bank of the United States (established by the first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton).
Nearby, on the corner of Wall Street and Nassau Street, is Federal Hall, the site of the first United States Capitol Building and the location of George Washington’s inaugural. A statue of the first President stands imposingly in front, gesturing as if to say “hold your applause.”
Nearby at Broadway and Wall Street is Trinity Wall Street Episcopal Church, first charted during colonial days (1696) by King William III. The current building on the site dates from 1846, but the cemetery attached to it is much older, and one of the few in Manhattan. It holds several luminaries, including Robert Fulton (inventor of the steamboat) as well as Alexander Hamilton and his wife Eliza Schuyler Hamilton.
Walking behind the cemetery along Church Street, it is impossible to miss One World Trade. Adjacent to the original footprints of the World Trade Center (now reflecting pools) and the site of the 9-11 Museum, it dominates the skyline in the area, and is now open for business. The influx of workers to One World Trade is bringing new shops and restaurants to the area. The new World Trade Center transportation hub is due to open at the intersections of Vesey, West Broadway, and Greenwich Streets at the end of 2015. Designed by famed Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, it has been the source of controversy over its cost and overruns. However, seeing it soar in such an emotionally impactful area (Calatrava has said it is supposed to look like a bird being released from a child’s hand) was very pleasing to me.
Prior to 2001 and the 9-11 attacks, about 15-20,000 residents lived in the Financial District. Nothing could be more revealing of the strong and resilient nature of New Yorkers (and also of the success of some incentives and tax breaks created by the city to spur growth) than the fact that now there are over 60,000 residents of the neighborhood. In 2014, the average price per square foot in the Financial District was higher than the average in Manhattan for the first time, comparable to that of the Upper West Side and Greenwich Village. Simultaneously historic and fresh, this neighborhood is the closest thing New York City has to the center of Rome, where new buildings are interspersed with views of the Forum or Coliseum.
The hottest ticket in New York City this year is Lin-Manuel Miranda’s new musical, “Hamilton,” currently at the Public Theater on Lafayette Street but moving to Broadway this summer. Coincidentally the day after I was fortunate enough to see it, while searching for a new apartment for a couple, I found a possibility for them in Hamilton Heights. Of course I had heard of the neighborhood in upper Manhattan and had been there before, but the connection to Alexander Hamilton didn’t fully register until that moment. I decided that my next dérive (an unplanned walk in an urban environment) would take place in Hamilton Heights, while the soundtrack to “Hamilton” was still freshly ringing in my head.
Hamilton Heights lies between 135th and 155th Streets to the south and north, and between Edgecombe Road and the Hudson River to the east and west. This puts it just south of Washington Heights (location of Miranda’s “In the Heights”) and just north of Manhattanville and Morningside Heights. Why all the “heights” in upper Manhattan? Take a walk in any of these neighborhoods, and you will see – the elevation in this part of the island is considerable, and some streets are quite steep, particularly rising from the Hudson. Alexander Hamilton’s farmland in the last two years of his life before the infamous duel with Aaron Burr was roughly in the part of the neighborhood between 140th and 146th Streets.
Public transportation options are good in Hamilton Heights. The 1, A, B, C, and D trains all make stops here, and it is possible to get from 155th Street to Times Square in about 15 minutes. For my dérive, I took the C and emerged at St. Nicholas Avenue and 135th Street. St. Nicholas Park rises steeply to the west of St. Nicholas Avenue here, and the majestic neo-Gothic tower of Shepard Hall of the City College of New York can be seen rising from the ice-age Manhattan schist that was used to construct the iconic campus buildings. CCNY was the first public institution of higher learning in the United States, and the beauty of its campus holds up to the private colleges and universities that predated it. Ten Nobel Prize winners have graduated from CCNY, the most recent alum winning for Medicine in 2014.
Just to the north of the main quad of CCNY sits Alexander Hamilton’s home for the final two years of his life, named Hamilton Grange after his ancestral home in Scotland. This location in St. Nicholas Park is not where he lived, however – the house itself has been moved three times, but has settled in this location, not too far from its original spot. The Grange is a National Park Service site, and has been restored to reflect its appearance during 1802-1804 when Hamilton lived in it.
Walking north on Hamilton Terrace from St. Nicholas Park, it is easy to forget that you are in Manhattan. This is a very quiet, residential neighborhood with rows of townhouses or brownstones on tree-lined streets. Hamilton Terrace goes on for blocks without any intersections, and most of the townhouses here date from the 1890’s. Hamilton Terrace runs into Convent Avenue, and continuing north, the sub-neighborhood of Sugar Hill reveals stately rowhouses that once were the residences of famous New Yorkers such as Cab Calloway, W.E.B DuBois, Duke Ellington, and Babe Ruth (when he was an infant). Nicknamed Sugar Hill because it was where wealthy residents of Harlem moved in the 1920’s to enjoy the “sweet life,” the area holds large pre-war apartments that are still affordable, by current New York City standards.
The Billy Strayhorn standard, “Take the A Train,” most familiar as an instrumental version performed by the Duke Ellington orchestra, does have lyrics, and they give you clear directions about how to get to this charming affordable neighborhood in upper Manhattan:
You must take the A Train
To go to Sugar Hill way up in Harlem
If you miss the A Train
You’ll find you’ve missed the quickest way to Harlem
Hurry, get on, now, it’s coming
Listen to those rails a-thrumming (All Aboard!)
Get on the A Train
Soon you will be on Sugar Hill in Harlem
When one thinks of living in New York City, apartment living is the default – and in fact the majority of New Yorkers do live in multi-occupant housing, ranging from luxury high rises in Manhattan to duplexes in College Point, Queens. However, apartment living is a relatively recent development in NYC history, and even today there are single-family townhouses (and even a handful of outright mansions) available in the city. What’s the definition of a townhouse versus a mansion? Well, there firm criteria do not exist, but a townhouse 25 feet wide or wider starts to be under consideration as a mansion, particularly if the façade is limestone and the overall square footage is 10,000 or above. (Also, you will know it when you see it.) In Europe, a mansion traditionally has a ballroom, but there are few of those left in New York City.
The golden age of mansions in New York City was in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and many of those mansions in fact did hold ballrooms. The Clark Mansion on Fifth Avenue at 77th Street (now the site of an apartment building) had 25 bedrooms and 35 servant’s rooms. Charles Schwab built a 75 room mansion on Riverside Drive between 73rd and 74th Streets, also now replaced by an apartment complex. The Vanderbilt Mansion on Fifth and 57th, the largest residence ever built in New York City, had a two story ballroom as well as stables – and was destroyed to be replaced by Bergdorf Goodman. Some of the mansions in Carnegie Hill (all 50,000 square feet or more) faced somewhat better fates. The Carnegie Mansion now holds the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, the Warburg Mansion houses the Jewish Museum, and the Otto Kahn House is the location of the Convent of the Sacred Heart, an independent school.
Until the end of the 19th century, apartment buildings – mainly tenements – were only for the less affluent. The middle class began to be attracted to the convenience of apartment living as the 20th century dawned, but the truly wealthy continued to live in single family homes until enough spacious apartments along Fifth Avenue (many with 12 rooms or more) were built and certain buildings became more prestigious. By the 1930’s, the tide had turned and more middle- and upper-class New Yorkers lived in apartment buildings than in single family homes, and now there are fewer than 2000 single family homes in Manhattan. However, there are considerably more in other boroughs. While a single family brownstone in Park Slope, Brooklyn, is just as difficult to find (and afford) as one on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, it is possible to find a variety of housing choices elsewhere, such as detached single family homes in Flushing, Queens or Staten Island, and even enormous homes with lawns in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn (home of the famous holiday light displays in December). For those with the funds to spend $20-100M on their new home, the few genuine mansions available offer far more square footage (and often significantly lower real estate taxes, unless comparing to a new development condo with a tax abatement) than some of the new Billionaire’s Row apartments making the news. Similarly, a townhouse in Washington Heights near the landmarked Morris-Jumel Mansion offers considerably more space than a similarly priced 2 bedroom coop on the Upper East Side.
Townhouse living is radically different from apartment living, and there are those who would never consider living in a townhouse in the city (the stairs – no super – even having to take out and bag your own garbage!). However, for the person who does appreciate the difference, being able to own an actual home, as opposed to shares in a corporation (in a coop) or a certain number of square feet within a building (in a condo) is priceless. Real estate taxes often favor the single family dwelling, and of course there is no coop or condo board process to go through – if you can pay for the townhouse and the owner accepts your offer, you are in. I have a customer who will accept nothing else but a townhouse (specifically, between Central Park West in the 60’s or 70’s!), but many others who appreciate the convenience of an apartment in an elevator doorman building. Much as New York City neighborhoods provide a rich diversity in atmosphere to live within the city, the variety of housing types (condos, coops, and townhouses) also provide the possibility of finding the perfect home for each potential home owner – one that fits their own individuality, as well as helping them express it.
Julie Brannan, NYC residential real estate 