Greenwich Village Townhouse - good deal?

NYcityboy, that's such a small market that's it pretty difficult to price. A high-end renovated single family house of that size on or around Jane St would probably fetch at least $10m. I have no idea if ppsf would even be reliable for such a thing, so would probably do some digging into the history on similar townhouses in the area.

curbed ran something on what may be a comp today:

http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2010/07/21/landmark_village_townhouse_cant_live_up_to_sellers_expectations.php

A lot depend on the width of the townhouse which drives the usable area. Also, I am assuming that you are including ground floor in the sq footage (need to know the ceiling height of the ground floor). What is the lot size. Not possible to answer your questions without more detail by $10mm is too high. Typically no more than $1500 a sq foot.

> Not possible to answer your questions without more detail by $10mm is too high

agreed. not even close.

swe, it's just not your day today, is it? I'm no expert on the west village townhouse market, but here are a couple comparable properties:
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/492867-townhouse-23-perry-street-west-village-new-york
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/505819-townhouse-149-west-10th-street-greenwich-village-new-york
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/359802-house-64-bethune-street-west-village-new-york

$10m seems more than close. Whoops.

"A high-end renovated single family house of that size on or around Jane St would probably fetch at least $10m"
I'd like to see recent comps which show that.
Also, townhouses on Jane Street aren't in the same league as the better blocks of Charles, Perry, St Lukes, West 11th, etc.

On the market you have (depending on where your "renovated" line stands):

284 W 11th
110 West 13th St
60 Jane
88 Bedford )
55 Wet 9th St - off market

112 Washington Place appears to have sold for $7,250,000 on 9/21/2009

30 Years.... Welcome back. Your insight has been missed.

30yrs, I'm more than willing to eat my words here, but you're the only person to post reasonable comps so far. I certainly don't know this particular market as well as some, but I think the key words in the OP are "high-end", "full renovation", "single family", and over 4000 sqft (this is assuming the renovation builds on the air rights). The three houses I listed seem to hit on all those characteristics, so pricing at $10m doesn't seem ridiculous to me. I get that Jane isn't quite as desirable as Charles, etc., but Bethune (and correct me if I'm wrong) not so much. And if that's in contract for a price around $11.5m. I'd also say 112 Washington Pl is more central village, so I understand the discount. It's also a smaller house at 3500 sqft.

Bjw: I watch the TH market on the UWS closely, GV less so. My observation as to the single-family 8-digit ask fully renovated game is that it's all about holding out for the silly money. If one has the patience and the reserves, thus far over the last 3-4 years, a mint condition, beautifully renovated TH will eventually land the 10m+ buyer. As for those that don't, the listings just get yanked off the market, depriving the market of getting real-er comps.

10023, if it's not clear, I completely agree it's silly money. In my experience with uber-rich people who have the mindset of have-to-have a west village townhouse, they're a less sensible bunch when it comes to cost. But in the interest of not offending others as my $10m suggestion seems to have done, I'll agree that $10m is aggressive. I just find a "not even close" comment without a shred of evidence to support it to be entirely worthless.

Bjw: the examples I have in mind of single-fam, fully-renovated are:

1) Adam Gordon house (Jane?)
2) the house that sold to the Chipotle dude
3) Julianne Moore's - didn't sell
4) the music (?) dude with model wife - didn't sell

10023, #4 could be anything! I was thinking more along the lines of the single-fams on Bethune. I believe Marc Jacobs got one.

4) Not anything. It was on curbed.com, look through archives.

Dug it up on curbed

1) 92 Jane: Adam Gordon sale to Chipotle dude
2) 92 Charles: some biblical theme park dude

Both north of 10m

3) J Moore was asking 11.995m

4) still working on it.

10023, I know you have a particular place in mind for #4 - was merely poking fun at how generic a music dude with model wife sounds.

Thanks guys. The house is 20 ft wide by 70 deep. Sure, its not on one of *the* best greenwich/west village blocks, but what if I told you it would be obtainable for less than $750 per sq ft? Its a 1350 sq. ft lot approximately.

Other bldgs that didn't sell

1) Uma Thurman's on W9th
2) Katie Lee on Perry
3) Baseball dude on W9th (#60)

NYcity, not to blow up your spot too much, but is it this one?
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/514666-townhouse-8-jane-street-west-village-new-york

BJW, no its not that one. The other thing is also that its on Greenwich Ave so its not a very quiet street like Jane...
Good try though.

NYcityboy - Have you tried to finance a building with a veterinarian (aka commercial tenant) recently? The lease does not roll for 2.5 years.

In this regards, markets are efficient. You will either have to pay all cash or get unattractive financing with a 25 year amortization; debt service will limit leverage to ~50%. If it was multifamily, it would have cleared several price cuts ago. The best way to go would involve leveraging something else (securities, another primary residence) but collectively it involves a lot of cheddar and will be dilutive, even at $750/s.f.

Here are your renovated single family comps.:
Sales - across the street - http://streeteasy.com/nyc/house/100-greenwich-avenue-manhattan
Rental – next door - http://streeteasy.com/nyc/house/109-greenwich-avenue-manhattan

5) Gisele Bundchen sold on Barrow for 13m
6) Adam Gordon (under 10m) at 60 Jane

Still looking for the music production dude with model ex-wife.

Found it. Not WV, but Central.

East 10th, 19.9m. No takers.
Media mogul (not music producer) + model ex-wife.

http://www.observer.com/2009/slideshow/112878/bulletproof-class

92 Jane = 24 feet wide!!!!!!!!!! HUGE premium.

Don't even THINK about putting 18 West 9th in a comparison of any of these. It is totally in another league (I live almost directly across the street. Some day I'll give the recent history when I have time.

Same for 20 E 10th - 25 foot wide, 6800 SF? Come on...... and 60 W 9th another 25 footer.....

I'll have to look at this again when I have more time, but it looks like you are comparing Corvettes and Vipers to Ferrari's and Lambo's (or Mercs to Maybachs or.......)

OP's question was non-specific as to width.

Propertyshark may be useful as well. You can put in the address and do a comparables search within half a mile of the block. Again, this is important if you want to know they actually sold for, not asking prices.
I think you'll see some quite astonishing numbers pre 2008, and you'll probably see not necessarily low prices post but low volume.

62 Jane has 3000 sqft and asking $7.5
60 Jane has 4000 sq ft and asking $9.75
8 Jane has 3200 sq ft and asking $4.3, if this isn't the one, it should be the one ;)

But again, I would look deeper at very recent sales prices and pay less attention to asking prices out there. Im starting to see prices in townhouses in other neighborhoods as well that have given me slight pause as to whether I should scrap looking for an apartment and buy a 2 or 3 family and collect some rent instead.

truthskr, without giving too much away, where are you seeing townhouse numbers making sense? The Brownstone Brooklyn market has held up surprisingly well, so pricing still makes no sense to me from an investment standpoint. But I can't say I've looked at every single property recently either.

BJW
Gramercy Park / Murray Hill. And it's not always out in front on websites, again there are "asking prices" and there are those that are motivated and talk turkey in person.

Btw NYCboy, check out 9 commerce as well
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/496518-house-9-commerce-street-west-village-new-york

Curious why would any one pay more than $750 per raw sq ft for a 20 ft wide townhouse as the stairs and exterior walls will take up almost 5-6 foor of that width.

Thanks truthskr, absolutely agree about what the "real" pricing is. List doesn't tell you much of the seller's story. 9 Commerce looks interesting - not the greatest block, but a pretty great address nonetheless.

9 commerce - bear in mind that it changed hands for 2.15m in '07. Doesn't look like a good deal at 2.9mish.

9 commerce - according to deed in ACRIS, 21' by 38ish feet. 3 flors above grade, assume built full, that's 2400sqft. Yeah, okay. Well north of 1000 at ask. And you cannot finance this. So all cash.

10023, I may need a little education here: listing says 4 stories and notes air right to build another floor, photo shows 3 stories. Are they including basement in the 4 stories? Or assuming a built addition? It's confusing, to say the least.

Also, the ask is 2.75m. But been on the market since Feb. I would assume they're fairly negotiable at this point.

I'm sure 30yrs can clarify. But based on the age of the house and pictures, the 1st floor looks like it's NOT fully above grade, which means that if there is a cellar beneath that, that the cellar is not 8' high. Compare to a high-stoop townhouse where the 1st floor is completely above grade, and 100% of the time there is an 8' cellar. So I suppose you can say that it's 4 X 800 sqft = 3200, but it won't have an 8' basement underneath, and some of the 1st floor may be taken up by mechanicals out of necessity.

It is crazy that a TH which changed hands in a bubbly market for 2.15m would get anything close to that in this climate.

You can't get everything from a computer screen, as tempting as it is to do so. (I am notoriously guilty myself)
Everyone needs to beat their feet a little bit, especially in this market.

And for those looking for 3/4 story townhouses,you can't rely soley on SE. You have to be looking at massey knakel listings as well.

And here's a great example of how asking prices are far removed from what's doable.
107 Greenwich 3800 sq ft multi started in June 2009 at $5,350,000,
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/sale/438484-107-greenwich-ave-west-village-new-york and no longer showing for sale on SE is on Massey Knakal for $3,250,000.

nyc10023, thanks, I think you're right about the 1st floor. Just spoke to the broker - there's a contract on it, so currently unavailable. He's not even showing it. Curious what it goes for.

"You can't get everything from a computer screen, as tempting as it is to do so. (I am notoriously guilty myself) Everyone needs to beat their feet a little bit, especially in this market."

truthskr, I couldn't agree more (and am guilty myself at times) - the amount of proselytizing that goes on on this site is, frankly, insane, considering some of the worst offenders do all of their analysis from behind a computer screen.

Does any one have any insight on this?

"Curious why would any one pay more than $750 per raw sq ft (calculated including walls) for a 20 ft wide townhouse as the stairs and exterior walls will take up almost 5-6 feet of that width."

Thanks.

Oh my (insert deity). This proves that y'all are pimply boys living in their mothers' basements in Iowa. I walked by 9 Commerce, and it's the house RIGHT on the corner of 7th Avenue. 1m.

10023, you can see right from the photos it's on the corner of 7th. For a reduced price relative to the rest of the nabe, I'd take it. Now that the contract's out (and presumably signed if the broker won't even show it), friendly wagers as to what it goes for? I say $2.35m, despite the 07 price.

10023....It's fair to criticize my bringing up 9 commerce, based on cityboy's initial post of wanting to convert a 3 family to a one, therefore indicating it is likely for himself and personal use.
Of course looking at the ad morphed into, "what can I do with it" which led to thoughts of possible small restaurant, as it is painfully obvious as BJW points out this building is on 7th ave.
Which leads to ask, did you really have to walk by it to know it was just off 7th???

I'd suspected, but hadn't bothered looking it up on taxmaps/googlemaps to be sure. I just happened to be in the nabe, and walked by.

The location is ultra-bad. Houses like this remind me of the Weehawken (?) houses that overlook LT traffic. Obviously, there is always going to be a taker at a much reduced price, but I gotta think that 2.35m + reno (500k if on the cheapy-cheap end) buys you something nicer, albeit smaller and you don't have to live on 7th.

Ultra-bad is a bit over-the-top, I think, but yeah, not at all the ideal location many of the west village blocks are. I'm not agreeing that it's actually worth 2.35m+ reno costs, but it seems someone is paying about that much. Crazier things have happened in these parts.

9 commerce
Whoops a daisy, no sale, and current asking is $2.495.
Always suspicious of in contract or sold claims exactly 6 months after listing date(end of brokerage agreement).

truthskr, yep, the broker emailed me to tell me the deal fell through. I can't see it going any higher than $2.35m, so was surprised to see it in contract when the ask was as high as it was.

9 Commerce inexplicably back on the market at $3m. Nuts, I tell you, nuts. Maybe if the location were better...