building at 1 Union Square South

Related is one of the most expensive landlords in the city. Part of their strategy.
And also as you note, low vacancies, so they don't need to offer much.
Archstone is much lower quality.

Related has a superb reputation and only the finest buildings.

Thanks for the replies. It may not be the case for this particular building, but I believe vacancies for Related may be heavily rising, as for the first time ever, I saw a commercial for them advertising rentals (the same case with many dying condos).

If the market continues down, I can't imagine the prices at this building remaining sustainable.

Also, does anyone know if this is an 80/20 rental building?

Thanks

mercuricoxide, Related buildings are all overpriced. This is a decent building, definitely better than most NYC rentals, but is not worth $5K for a 1-bedroom. Objectively speaking, Related buildings are mediocre, but because the quality of rentals in NYC are so low, they can charge that much.

And yes, it is an 80/20 building, which means that 20% of the residents are bums who make less than $40K/year and pay only about 800 for a 1-bedroom while everyone else has to spend $5K. It's NYC liberalism at work!

I lived there in a corporate apartment for about 4 months back in 2006. I can't say enough positive things about the building. It is a full service building with gym, community terrace and a great and helpful staff. Unit fixtures were good quality, but they didn't have marble baths, kitchens, etc. Only negative for us was no washer/dryer in the unit. The street noise was remarkably low, although we were on a high floor. There were no issues with the 80/20, I didn't even realize it.

Since then, we moved into a Glenwood-managed building, which I think is even higher quality than this building (marble baths/kitchen, etc). However, they just tried to raise my rent and don't want to negotiate very much. If you want more luxury look into Glenwood, but they're expensive too.

To quantum:

Yeah, I've realized that Related is very over priced. I also don't know how anyone can stomach paying 5k for a 1 bedroom when your subsidized neighbor is paying 1/5 of that.

To Goldie:

Thanks for the critique. I only asked about 80/20 for psychological reasons like the one I listed above, the people don't usually cause problems. And yes, I've heard a lot of things about Glenwood.

We only liked this building since it's a luxury rental right on the park. I would probably only consider it if the 1 bedrooms came down to 4k absolute max.

Making less than $40K = bum. How simple your world view is.

It's disgraceful that people get to live in an apartment at 1/5 the price of what the others are paying simply because they're poor and the city feels sorry for them.

Wow, you must really hate the people who win the lottery too. Those beer-guzzling chain-smoking laggards who get lucky for no reason. What are they, bums? Or are they only bums if they don't make much money and win? If they make a fair amount and are slumming for entertainment and win are they assholes? Or still bums?

I like having people around me who don't make a ton. Frequently they are more interesting, if not necessarily nicer, but I know I can't STAND the 20/30 something hipster who makes alot and thinks his/her shit doesn't stink. I'll take the bums as neighbors any day. Wait, I live in Peter Cooper, so I DO have the bums living near me. Many of them are the bums who returned from WWII, and/or their spouses/children. God, they should have been put on the street if they couldn't afford a damn apartment, not shunted off to a drafty enclave near the East River that had been the site of toxic activities for years. Maybe it's OK if we give the bums such inferior housing, just not the good stuff?

I probably shouldn't have brought up the 80/20 question. Can we please try to get back on topic with opinions of the actual building?

Thanks

I think it's in a great location, and I think it's overpriced. I think that there are decent rentals in the neighborhood that aren't owned by the mega-companies, but I wouldn't know how to locate them without using a broker. Maybe canvassing the neighborhood (in the snow Saturday?).

Related is having a slew of vacancies. They provide very good service, and their product is somewhat uncommon in that their units are relatively nice and like Glenwood they are easy to find, contact, etc. But for that ease, at least for now, you pay more.

Thanks for the contribution aboutready

Sorry for the rant, my rufus/quantam anger temporarily overcame my better judgment. Good luck. It would be great if we could maintain threads (like the comp threads) on rentals looked at, discovered, friend found, etc., even noticed rentals available signs in nice looking locations/buildings, with any pricing info (which may be scarcer than buying info, but info is info) available.

Yeah, I agree.

I know that Archstone doesn't represent the entire luxury market here, but their site here:

http://www.archstoneapartments.com/Search_Results.htm?state=NY&market=90

This has all the availabilities for their Manhattan apts, so you can at least look at the data there.

Their prices seem to have come down by $500-1000 over the past yr, but still too high in some cases.

If NYC built more high-quality rental buildings, prices would go down. You can blame the city's retarded policies for the exorbitatn rent.