Jeff Bezos moved into his new Manhattan home last month after closing on three adjacent apartments overlooking Madison Square Park.
The newly divorced Mr. Bezos, Amazon’s founder and chief executive, not to mention the world’s richest person, could have bought anywhere in New York City (and, yes, he did tour the ultra-pricey 220 Central Park South). He chose a grand triplex penthouse and a pair of units just below at the recently converted 212 Fifth Avenue in NoMad, with 17,300 square feet of space covering four floors. The purchase was made through separate deals totaling $80 million: $51.5 million for the penthouse and $28.5 million for the smaller apartments.
While the penthouse sale was among the year’s largest closings, it wasn’t even the city’s most expensive in June. A double-wide townhouse at 14-16 East 67th Street, once home to Bob Guccione, the founder of Penthouse magazine, sold for $77.1 million, the highest price ever paid for a residential townhouse in New York.
Sales activity throughout the city was unusually brisk in June, despite a continuing luxury-market slowdown. Deep-pocketed buyers hurried to close on sales contracts to avoid paying New York’s higher “mansion tax,” which took effect July 1. The tax, in place for three decades, had been 1 percent on home sales of $1 million or more; it now rises incrementally with purchase prices, up to 3.9 percent for sales of $25 million or more. (Under the change, the tax on Mr. Bezos’s purchases would have been $3.12 million instead of $800,000.)
“The new tax isn’t causing more new sales, but is motivating earlier closings,” said the real estate appraiser Jonathan J. Miller, “essentially pulling sales that would have organically closed in July, August and September to beat the tax.”
The bevy of big-ticket transactions in June included two purchases in the villa portion of 220 Central Park South along with another in the tower portion, as well as two apartments at 432 Park Avenue and an apartment at 520 Park Avenue. Downtown there was the sale of another sprawling triplex, at the Abingdon in the West Village, and sizable penthouse sales at 150 Charles Street, the Jenga-like 56 Leonard and the Kushner Companies’ Puck Building.
Among the many other notable closings, Graydon Carter, the former editor of Vanity Fair magazine, sold his West Village townhouse. On the Upper East Side, Carl Berg, a real estate investor and venture capitalist, also sold a townhouse, while Jack Welch, the former head of General Electric, parted with a full-floor apartment. Even the United States government was part of June’s dizzying buying spree.
And now for some of the details.
Mr. Bezos’s purchase, via a limited liability company, came just four months after Amazon canceled plans to build a corporate campus in Long Island City, Queens, following a backlash over tax breaks and other incentives the tech giant would have received. Earlier in the year, Mr. Bezos and his wife of 25 years, the novelist MacKenzie Bezos, also announced plans to divorce. The three units he bought atop the 24-story 212 Fifth Avenue, at East 26th Street, presumably to combine, seem to represent a fresh start for Mr. Bezos, and at least a personal commitment to New York City.
The Crown Penthouse, as it is called, had an initial price tag of $73.8 million. It totals 10,079 square feet from the 22nd to 24th levels, with five bedrooms, five full baths and three half baths, along with a ballroom, library and private elevator, according to the listing with Sotheby’s International Realty. There are also 5,730 square feet of terraces providing park and cityscape vistas. Monthly carrying costs total $37,000.
The two additional apartments — 21A, with a recent asking price of $18.15 million, and 21B, recently $11.3 million — have a total of 7,239 square feet with seven bedrooms and seven and a half baths.
Sotheby’s Nikki Field, Mara Flash Blum, Kevin Brown and Brad Ingalls were the listing agents, while John Burger of Brown Harris Stevens represented Mr. Bezos. All declined to discuss the transaction, as did Joseph Sitt, the president of Thor Equities, the building’s developer, along with Madison Equities and Building and Land Technology.
Mr. Sitt did say that the neo-Gothic tower, built in 1912 and formerly an office building, was now essentially sold out. “The bones in the building were great,” he said in an interview, “and so is the location. It’s very cool, hip and happening.”
The mansion at East 67th Street, near Central Park between Fifth and Madison Avenues, was sold in an off-market deal by Philip A. Falcone, a former hedge fund manager, and his wife, Lisa Maria Falcone, a film producer. The buyer was John Griffin, the founder of the Blue Ridge Capital hedge fund (no relation to Ken Griffin, another hedge fund manager, who made a record $240 million purchase at 220 Central Park South in January).
The Falcones bought the house from Mr. Guccione’s creditors in 2008 for $49 million, then undertook an extensive renovation that included adding a pool, gym and theater. The home was originally two separate buildings that were combined in 1920. It is 48 feet wide and six stories high, with 28,000 square feet of interior space.
The sale broke the city’s previous residential townhouse record set in 2006, according to Mr. Miller, when the financier J. Christopher Flowers paid $53 million for the Harkness mansion on East 75th Street. Adam D. Modlin of the Modlin Group, who represented Mr. Falcone, declined to comment on the transaction.
Villa No. 6 at 220 Central Park South was acquired for $39 million, and villa No. 4 for about $33.3 million. The units are among 10 apartments in the 18-story villa building, which faces Central Park, with the 65-floor limestone tower rising behind it. Each apartment is nearly 5,000 square feet, with five bedrooms and six and a half baths, according to the listings with the Corcoran Group.
In the tower portion of the complex, unit No. 31B sold for $16.5 million. It has just under 2,500 square feet, with two bedrooms and two and a half baths.
A few blocks away at 432 Park Avenue, two apartments closed, including a three-bedroom, three-and-a-half-bath penthouse on the 94th floor that was acquired by the biotech investor Roy T. Eddleman through a trust for $31.5 million. Another unit, on the 86th floor, with three bedrooms and four and a half baths, was bought by the philanthropists Roger and Susan Hertog for $29.5 million.
At 607 Hudson Street, a.k.a. the Abingdon, overlooking Abingdon Square Park, the hedge fund manager Steven A. Cohen sold his triplex for $30 million. Mr. Cohen, the founder of SAC Capital Advisors and Point72 Asset Management, had paid $23.4 million for the condo in 2013.
The 9,600-square-foot unit, No. 2, is one of 10 residences in the seven-floor boutique building, which was built in 1906 and converted from a nursing home. The triplex has its own entry off the lobby and has five bedrooms, four full baths and two powder rooms, as well as a private, 332-square-foot courtyard on the second level.
Around the corner, at 22 Bank Street, Mr. Carter, the longtime editor in chief of Vanity Fair, sold his longtime home, a four-story, Greek Revival, brick townhouse built in 1844. The price was $17.4 million. The buyer is reportedly Scott Rudin, the theater and film producer whose most recent work is Broadway’s “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
Other downtown deals included a full-floor penthouse at 56 Leonard in TriBeCa that sold for $25 million. The apartment has four bedrooms and four and a half baths, along with panoramic views of the Hudson and East Rivers, according to the Corcoran listing.
A five-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bath penthouse at 150 Charles Street, overlooking the Hudson River and Hudson River Park in the West Village, sold for $31.9 million.
Also, a penthouse at the Puck Building, at 295 Lafayette Street in SoHo, went for $18 million. It is one of six loft-style penthouses developed there by Kushner Companies, formerly led by Jared Kushner, son-in-law and a senior adviser to President Trump.
The priciest co-op transaction in June was a penthouse at 730 Park Avenue, between East 70th and 71st Streets. The residence was deeded to the financier Daniel C. Benton by his former wife, Anna Nikolayevsky, also a money manager. The two had purchased the six-bedroom, top-floor unit in late 2012 for $39 million. The latest deal was valued at $17.5 million.
Mr. Benton is now married to the actor Stephanie March, formerly of “Law & Order: SVU.”
Elsewhere on the East Side, Mr. Welch, the chairman and chief executive of G.E. from 1981 to 2001, finally sold his 46th-floor home at 151 East 58th Street, a.k.a. One Beacon Court, for $17 million. He initially wanted $25.9 million last year.
The 5,782-square-foot apartment is a combination of two units that Mr. Welch bought in 2005 and 2009 through a trust for a total of $14.6 million. It has four bedrooms and three and a half baths, and incorporates exotic woods, onyx and marble throughout. Floor-to-ceiling windows offer panoramic views of Central Park.
Several blocks away at 9 East 84th Street, off Fifth Avenue, is the limestone mansion sold by Mr. Berg, the real estate investor, and his wife, Rachel Berg. The closing price was $19 million. The 25-foot-wide, five-story structure, built at the turn of the last century, has 14,400 square feet, with seven bedrooms, six full baths and four powder rooms. Its amenities include a basketball court and a 53-foot pool with a separate hot tub.
The newly opened, 54-story 520 Park Avenue, at East 60th Street, had a sale on the 33rd floor. The full-floor, 4,628-square-foot unit, with four bedrooms and five baths, sold for $28 million. (Across town, the sale of a penthouse combination at the newly opened 250 West 81st Street was close behind in price, at nearly $27.5 million.)
And at 50 United Nations Plaza, there were three purchases, including some new diplomatic digs. A five-bedroom, six-and-a-half-bath penthouse was obtained by the federal government for $15.85 million.
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