NEW YORK | Central Park Tower (Nordstrom)| 1,550 FT | 131 FLOORS

[Vortex11]

I'm thinking CPT is pushing 300 feet now?

[Mutrak]

So now it will start to rise faster ?

[tokilamockingbrd]

Originally Posted by Mutrak

So now it will start to rise faster ?

IMO it already has. The last few updates have shown very noticeable progress.

[gramsjdg]

So they should be starting the cantilever any day now?

[NYguy]

http://urbanismvsmodernism.blogspot.com/

BRANDON NAGLE

[artspook]

that wiggly facade looks like they're putting in a K-mart.

[gramsjdg]

Any truth to the rumors on SSC that this will be capped at 23 floors until the ultra-lux market "recovers"?

The very slow pace of this has had me worried... I hope I'm wrong.

Getting flashbacks to the Chicago Spire debacle... the curse of trying to exceed the Sears Tower roof height on American soil but always failing? for 43 years and counting?

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by gramsjdg

Any truth to the rumors on SSC that this will be capped at 23 floors until the ultra-lux market "recovers"?

The very slow pace of this has had me worried... I hope I'm wrong.

Getting flashbacks to the Chicago Spire debacle... the curse of trying to exceed the Sears Tower roof height on American soil but always failing? for 43 years and counting?

While I have no inside info, none of that makes any sense.

First, the project has full financing and full construction/union agreements. Second "23 floors" is totally random and not related to anything re. the building plans. Third, the project doesn't have a "slow pace" and is right on schedule for a 2019 opening.

And Chicago Spire is not related to this tower, in any way. Chicago Spire was the brainchild of a carpenter from Ireland who never built a highrise in his life, and the building never received financing. It was never a serious project. This tower is being built by the most important/successful highrise developer in the Western world.

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by gramsjdg

Any truth to the rumors on SSC that this will be capped at 23 floors until the ultra-lux market "recovers"?

The very slow pace of this has had me worried... I hope I'm wrong.

I think you've answered your question. If they are going to cap it at 23 floors, why would a slowdown be neccessary? Anyway, the building is moving along just fine. But beyond that, Barnett has talked about the ultra luxury market...


http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-cond...rk_real_estate

“There’s a lot of stuff that is chasing what happened three years ago or four years ago when there was a boom,” said Gary Barnett, Extell’s founder. “They’re late to the party and the party is ending. ”

Mr. Barnett isn’t running for the hills. He called the state of the high-end market a “temporary imbalance” that would be absorbed in a few years.

[CityGuy87]

^ The real question is, does Extell have a construction loan in place for this tower? Or will they be able to obtain one in the near future if they haven't already?

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by CityGuy87

^ The real question is, does Extell have a construction loan in place for this tower? Or will they be able to obtain one in the near future if they haven't already?

That's a question that can be asked of a lot of skyscrapers under construction right now, particularly at this stage. It's a question we would ask even if there wasn't a "slowdown" in the luxury market.


http://therealdeal.com/2016/05/23/lu...secutive-week/

Luxury resi market strong for 4th straight week
30 contracts signed at $4M and above: Olshan


May 23, 2016

What luxury residential market slowdown? A full 30 contracts were signed last week at $4 million above, the highest total so far this year, according to Olshan Realty’s weekly market report.

That marks four strong weeks in a row, with 29, 28 and 28 contracts signed over the past three, respectively.

Of course, when they're talking about the slowdown they really mean in the ultra luxury market. Barnett has said before that he doesn't need to reach the ultra luxury prices he did with One57 because he got the land relatively "cheap". But I'm sure the penthouse units will go for high amounts.

[CityGuy87]

Originally Posted by NYguy

That's a question that can be asked of a lot of skyscrapers under construction right now, particularly at this stage. It's a question we would ask even if there wasn't a "slowdown" in the luxury market.

Well the reason why I asked was because all the other major residential projects in the vicinity (111 w57th, 220 CPS, 53w53, 520 Park) all have confirmed construction financing but it's more ambiguous with this project since it's been well underway but as far as we know, it hasn't gotten a construction loan even though Extell is known for proceeding with a development without financing already in place.

Also, it's been well documented that many lenders are quite wary of the current ultra-luxury market, thus obtaining construction loans are a bit more difficult than they were a couple of years ago. And we all know what happens to projects that aren't able to get financing right away but I'd imagine the fact the Nordstrom is anchoring this tower with a huge retail store at the base would be more than enough to make lenders confident in the project. Plus Extell has a solid track record and I remember hearing that they were trying to partner up with a Chinese capital partner but that may or may not have gone through.

[chris08876]

Credit: NYY and Tectonic

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by CityGuy87

Well the reason why I asked was because all the other major residential projects in the vicinity (111 w57th, 220 CPS, 53w53, 520 Park) all have confirmed construction financing but it's more ambiguous with this project since it's been well underway but as far as we know, it hasn't gotten a construction loan even though Extell is known for proceeding with a development without financing already in place.

Those are different projects, different developers. This is a tower that hasn't even had a rendering released by the developer yet. I cannot get into the head of Gary Barnett to confirm his financing strategies for you (short of telling you to contact Extell directly). However, the building is under construction, and I've never worried where the people who build these things get their money from. It's going up, and that's fine.



http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/ny...d-it.html?_r=0


Lee’s Art Shop to Shutter as Midtown Towers Sprout Around It





By JAMES BARRON
MAY 23, 2016

Lee’s, a Midtown fixture for more than six decades, is at one end of a half-mile between Broadway and Park Avenue that is now being reshaped and redefined by supertall towers. One, at 157 West 57th Street, across the street from Carnegie Hall near Seventh Avenue, sold so many of its condominiums to buyers with long strings of zeros on their net worth statements that people began referring to the block as Billionaires’ Row.

Another supertall tower is going up across the street from Lee’s, in the block between Broadway and Seventh Avenue. It will house a Nordstrom department store, New York City’s first full-line outpost of that chain. Another tower has sprouted at the corner of Park Avenue. And yet another will soon rise on the site of a secondhand fur store next to the former home of Steinway & Sons, near Avenue of the Americas.

The new towers are remaking 57th Street at ground level. Longtime fixtures of 57th Street like Steinway and the Rizzoli bookshop have moved. Now there is talk in real estate circles of finding a single retail tenant for the Lee’s building that would take a page from the Ralph Lauren flagship store on Madison Avenue at 72nd Street.

“What’s going on here is destroying New York’s sense of place, particularly for an artist,” said Kate Simon, a photographer who has lived around the corner and up the block from Lee’s for 38 years. “What would Truman Capote write now, ‘Breakfast at Nordstrom’s’?”

“I’ve been watching them build all these huge buildings,” she said. “I think this is the last nail in the coffin of the neighborhood.”

[CCs77]

Originally Posted by gramsjdg

Any truth to the rumors on SSC that this will be capped at 23 floors until the ultra-lux market "recovers"?

The very slow pace of this has had me worried... I hope I'm wrong.

Getting flashbacks to the Chicago Spire debacle... the curse of trying to exceed the Sears Tower roof height on American soil but always failing? for 43 years and counting?

It is not that slow, compare the two pictures, from february and last week. Although it is not a huge progress for 3 months, it is still quite noticeable, and you have to take in account that in buildings like this, the first floors usually take longer to build.

Originally Posted by Mutrak

So now it will start to rise faster ?

I think it will rise at about the same rate until july, then they might begin with building the cantilever, when doing that, it will have no progress, apparently, for at least one and a half month, because building that cantilever will be a pretty complicated task. I estimate that by fall they will finish the cantilever and so on the pace should be much faster.

Originally Posted by NYguy

http://urbanismvsmodernism.blogspot.com/

BRANDON NAGLE

Originally Posted by ILNY

Going up sloooowly.

[gramsjdg]

Its really hard to tell what the current height of the core is from the photos- anybody have an idea?

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by gramsjdg

Its really hard to tell what the current height of the core is from the photos- anybody have an idea?

Not really sure. It's harder to gauge the height when you're standing near it.

[chris08876]

I don't think the slow down will affect this tower. The market is slowing down, no doubt, but its enough for the current pipeline of towers to be successful without waiting "x" amount of time for things to pick up.

Granted the number of units in contract gets reduced dramatically once you get to 20 mil +, but there is still enough activity to warrant this tower as not all of the units will be stupidly expensive in terms of 50 million plus. So I doubt any sort of capping. Why would they? Build it, sell the units that can sell, and the high profit units such as those that rival 220 CPS or 432 Park, wait until the market corrects itself or the demand picks up. If anything, the real risk question is how long will they have to wait until they sell all of those top units. As we've seen with One57 or 432 Park, it takes time through the lifecycle of the construction process. Can't be acute, which is expected with such a high profile tower.

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Credit for all: TRD

[Zapatan]

While the project does seem overly ambitious in a sense, and I've always worried about a Chicago Spire/Pentimonium like scenario with this project, I think it's best not to freak out until there's an actual source saying it'll be capped.

[NYguy]

Originally Posted by Zapatan

While the project does seem overly ambitious in a sense, and I've always worried about a Chicago Spire/Pentimonium like scenario with this project, I think it's best not to freak out
until there's an actual source saying it'll be capped.

Yes, there is no reason to "freak out", and there is nothing overly ambitious about this project.




MAY 24, 2016


Didn't look hard enough at the store renders to notice the 58th Street side will get the same facade treatment.




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