Open Houses: Sunday, August 2, 2009

12-12:30 PM

Society Hill Towers

210 Locust Street

2 bedrooms, 2 baths, corner residence with river views, lots of detail throughout $499,900

12:30-1 PM

Society Hill Towers

210 Locust Street

Corner 1 bedroom, 1 bath, parquet wood floors in living room, 775 sf $329,900

1-1:30 PM

Society Hill Towers

200 Locust Street

PENTHOUSE! 1 bedroom, 1 bath, updated kitchen and bath with high end finishes, panoramic bridge and river views $440,000

New Listing: Spectacular Society Hill Towers Condominium

Great new home at Society Hill Towers on the market...it is a combined unit totalling 2,616 sf. There are two bedrooms, 2.5 baths, and a den. The floors are marble and hardwood, there are floor to ceiling windows with with panoramic city and river views, a wet bar built into an antique armoir, a separate dining room and spacious master suite. This is incredible entertaining space!

Listed for $975,000. For more pictures and info, click here.

Philly Live! Renderings Unveiled

Philly Live!, a project being developed jointly by Comcast-Spectacor and the Cordish Co. which will link the Wachovia Center, Citizen's Bank Park, and Lincoln Financial Field with restaurants and entertainment venues, is becoming closer to reality. The project's first renderings were just revealed to the Philadelphia Planning Commission, a mostly enthusiastic audience. Check out the Inquirer article for more details. Here are the first two renderings:

Open Houses: Sunday, July 26, 2009

12-12:30 PM The Wanamaker House 2022 Walnut Street

Townhome with private entrance and direct access to the garage. This one bedroom, one bath residence is 700 square feet and has been updated with high end finishes and features throughout. $389,900

12:45-1:15 PM The Dorchester 226 W. Rittenhouse Square

Three bedroom, two bath home with a balcony overlooking Rittenhouse Square with treetop and city skyline views. The kitchen is updated and there are parquet wood floors in the living spaces. All of the closets are custom built and this home has great sunlight. $799,900

Parc Rittenhouse "Star Performer" in June, Murano Auction Fails to Ignite Condo Market

The postmortem on the Murano auction that was held on June 27 seems to be that it was good for the building in the long run, but did not spark the Center City condo market as a whole.  Check out Al Heaven's article from this morning's Inquirer.  As I've said from day one, the building lacks the most fundamental rule of real estate (for a luxury condominium): location.  However, even in this market, we see that for a low enough price point, buyers are willing to accept locations like this.  

Al Heaven's article also points out that Parc Rittenhouse, the luxury condominium on Rittenhouse Square, was one of Delta Associate's  "star performers" in June with a monthly sales pace of 5.4 units at $825 per square foot.  Not to sound redundant, but all I can say is: location, location, location.

Murano Auction Sells 42 Homes

The market spoke yesterday when the Murano auctioned off 42 units at discounted prices. Most of the 42 units sold at about 20 to 25% off the original asking price. In under two hours, close to $21 million of real estate was sold. Today's Inquirer article gives a good recap. Read it here.

We'll see where things go from here for the building. While the auction sold off 42 units at prices below the prior sales, the real question is what do you do post auction? How many people will want to buy a Murano condo after the publicity of the auction? When Wanamaker House auctioned off units in 1988 it took a good three to four years for the market in the bldg to recover. Only time will tell.