It's The Little Things

One would think that in this white hot real estate market, New York condos just sell themselves. Apparently not. Free commuter daily AMNY takes a look at the fringe benefits that developers employ to entice those well off enough to buy into Manhattan's real estate promised land. Laundry rooms and a concierge are yesterday's news.

So how do buildings decide whether to offer a Turkish bath over a bowling alley?

"Research is conducted through competitive analysis, buyer profiling, polling, interviews and trend analysis, amongst other things," said Arthur Gallego, spokesperson for Shvo, a luxury real estate marketing firm that specializes in new development sales. "The Turkish bath (at 20 Pine in the financial district) is essentially a very elegant, stylish steam room that any buyer who works hard in the city can appreciate. It seems extravagant, but it's actually quite usable."

We recently conducted a gawking tour through the common areas of a luxury building on Beaver St. and were struck by how much it reminded us of the common area of our freshman college dorm, with a number of residents clad in t-shirts and lacrosse or field hockey shorts intently tapping away on their laptops, (we were glad we didn't live there). We suggest viewing the slide show attached to AMNY's article. We're going to have to ponder how we manage to live without an in-house driving range, or "a rooftop solarium with a fireplace, wet bar and kitchen; a landscaped roof park with a lawn; and a 3,000-square-foot fitness center". Or have the option of on- or off-site wine storage. But these are our salad days, we guess.