Any thoughts about what happened in this sale? Why the dramatic drop in value since 2010? Did the buyer in 2010 simply overpay? Did they discover a problem with the apartment? Or is this emblematic of a larger market trend?

At the time, the then-listing agent said the owner's (who had just bought it) wife changed her mind and they looked for a new apt. Think it was to be a pied-a-terre - they never moved in.

The apt is really an overgrown classic 6 - the third bedroom is maid's room size. There were a number of blemishes, none of which were vetoes by themselves, but which added up:

1) 3rd bedroom is two-dimensional;
2) Dining room looks out into a cement wall;
3) IIRC, 1-2 of the other bathrooms (besides the one shown) had a hideous purple-blue motif;
4) Maintenace was really high- well over 2.0x square footage, even in 2010- think the building had a small number of apartments, making each one responsible for a lot, plus the retail was shunted off to that separate commercial unit structure.

The plus of the place was the spaciousness.

With the lack of leverage (no furniture in the place), the owner made a big mistake asking $1.65m, clearly trying to make up for the brokerage fee.

Guy really took a bath on this- 220k on the principal, 65k for 18 months of maintenance, 75k? broker fee, 25k flip tax (they had just put it in for 2010 too!), 18k transfer taxes = over $400,000.

Yikes that's some seriously high maintenance.

Crescent--

Thanks for your comments--I agree with your points. I thought another issue was the fact that the Master Bath is off the hall. Basically, the unit would require work to make it more liveable.

I did, however, like how they made the maid's room a true third bedroom off the front hall rather than the kitchen.

Plus, I've heard that it's a difficult board process, which restricts the buyer universe.

I looked at this apartment 2-3 years ago. At that point, the building had virtually no reserve fund. Dh wouldn't even consider looking at it after I told him that fact.