A TALE OF TWO REAL ESTATE MARKETS

Posted by Leonard Steinberg of URBAN COMPASS on July 25th, 2014 The entire USA real estate market is revealing a trend that we have witnessed in New York for some time now: brand newly constructed properties are selling for a significant premium over re-sale existing homes. The pricing variable is large. The supply is not… [Read More]

DOES HONG KONG MAKE NEW YORK SEEM CHEAP?

Posted by Leonard Steinberg of URBAN COMPASS on July 23rd, 2014 Pricing in Hong Kong remains high, with some penthouse apartments selling for over $ 14,000/sf.  Buyers from Hong Kong should look at the pricing of the mega-towers of the 57th Street corridor and consider them relatively good buys…..but are there enough Hong Kong buyers… [Read More]

LIMESTONE COMES TO WEST CHELSEA

Posted by Leonard Steinberg of URBAN COMPASS on July 20th, 2014 Limestone, a facade material most associated with tony Park Avenue and Fifth Avenue uptown buildings has emerged in……of all places….West Chelsea, Downtown New York! Very few buildings Downtown boast this beautiful material: 15 Central Park West clad its entire facade in Limestone to emulate… [Read More]

NEW YORK SIDEWALKS ARE ABOUT TO CHANGE

Posted by Leonard Steinberg of URBAN COMPASS on July 19th, 2014 It is just a matter of time before the sidewalks of New York will be lined with charging stations for electric vehicles: I have always resisted the urge to get a car and driver as the thought of a car idling in front of… [Read More]

MANHATTANIZING THE WORLD

Posted by Leonard Steinberg, Urban Compass, on July 18th, 2014 The other day while observing the views from the West Side of Manhattan across the Hudson River to New Jersey, it was striking to see how similar the New Jersey skyline looked compared to Manhattan’s. Does Manhattan dictate the ‘look’ of a large city throughout… [Read More]

LIRR STRIKE? IS $87K SALARY NOT ENOUGH FOR CLIPPING TICKETS?

Posted by Leonard Steinberg of URBAN COMPASS on July 16th, 2014 A Long Island Railroad strike is looming and at the core of the problem is a simple truth: commuters who use the LIRR cannot afford to pay more for the service in raised fares, there is a budget, and salaries cannot be raised in… [Read More]

$106 BILLION FEDERAL TAX DOLLARS MIS-MANAGED

Posted on July 13th, 2014 It amazes me how large organizations such as the Federal US government are grossly mis-managed: A government watchdog agency said an estimated $106 billion in payments were made in error last year (thats about $ 350 per American, and much more for those paying Federal taxes): meaning they were the… [Read More]

ARE LONDON BUYER-BLUES BEING MIRRORED IN NEW YORK?

Posted by Leonard Steinberg, President of Urban Compass, on July 8th, 2014 London is experiencing some BUYER-BLUES on the very high end and today its reported that home-price gains in London’s most-expensive neighborhoods are trailing the rest of the city because buyers are deterred by high asking prices and the possibility of new taxes. Values in… [Read More]

THE CURSE OF REAL ESTATE RANKINGS

Posted by Leonard Steinberg on July 7th, 2014 In the past few months all sorts of rankings have come out showing how real estate brokers fare next to one another in either the number of transactions they close, the total volume of sales, or the total volume of exclusives they have on their books. I… [Read More]