Luxury Condo Towers in Manhattan Offer Deep Discounts

Some of the priciest new addresses in Manhattan—luxury condo towers marketed to the super-rich—have been offering some steep discounts recently.

Central Park Tower, the 131-story luxury condo tower that is the tallest residential building in the world, has been closing some units for discounts of up to 20%, according to a report this week in Bloomberg.

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported that Related Companies has turned to deep discounts to try to unload the most expensive units at the crown jewel of its Hudson Yards development, 35 Hudson Yards.

As of the end of June, nearly half of the units at the luxury glass-and-limestone tower at 35 Hudson Yards remained unsold more than four years after sales launched, WSJ reported.

Related is slashing prices and offering incentives at the condo tower, including covering buyers’ taxes and closing costs. Recorded sales at 35 Hudson had closed for an average of 30% less than the original prices, and active listings were discounted by up to 50%, the report said.

A four-bedroom apartment recently traded for $8.5M at 35 Hudson Yards, about 46% less than its projected asking price of $15.7M, records show.

Central Park Tower, a luxury condo supertall with a $250M penthouse that is the most expensive residential listing in Manhattan, if not the known universe, secured a $500M refi this week, Bloomberg reported.

The financial package for the most lavish and tallest of residences on Billionaire’s Row on 57^th Street near Columbus Circle, built by Extell development and opened in 2020, was provided by British billionaires David and Simon Reuben, who were joined in the package by JPMorgan Chase.

The report said the new loan “replenished and supplemented” a previous $500M loan that had already been paid down through condo sales at the building.

The Reuben brothers have been betting big on NYC real estate, disclosing more than a half-dozen big-ticket investments in New York since the beginning of 2020, including the purchase of the Surrey Hotel on the Upper East Side, financing for the Time Hotel near Times Square and the Althorp, a luxury condo building on the Upper West Side.

Central Park Tower was Extell’s second condo tower on Billionaire’s Row. The 179-unit tower, which has a Nordstrom store on the ground floor, began closing units in 2021.

Some recent closings at Central Park Tower have involved discounts of more than 20% off the list price on some recent closings, according to the Bloomberg report.

The location of the Hudson Yards at the western edge of Manhattan adjacent to the West Side Highway was an expansion of the envelope for luxury condo towers.

“When we first opened the job, we thought we’d be able to get a higher price. The message [from the market] is that we were overreaching a bit,” Sherry Tobak, who heads sales for 35 Hudson Yards, told WSJ.