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Top Floor Unit at 1521 Sells for 27% Off 2009 Price

Posted on April 30, 2012May 2, 2012 by The Tim

A foggy portrait of 1521 2nd Ave by The TimThe crazy-luxury condo building at 1521 2nd Avenue—where the starting price is $1 million—is described on their website as follows:

It is the West Coast’s most successful condominium high-rise community with established market values.

In light of the “established market values” comment, I find it interesting to note (hat tip to WestSideBilly) that Unit 3802, the second-largest unit on the 38th floor (the tower’s top level), sold on Friday for $3.6 million.

That would be an “established market value” 27% below where it sold just three years ago in May 2009, for just shy of a cool $5.0 million.

The previous buyer only financed $2.5 million at purchase, followed by another $500k loan a few months later, so that entire $1.4 million loss is on them.

  • $1,362,820 loss on the sale
  • $386,778 in interest payments
  • $180,000 agent fees (assuming 2.5% commission)
  • $92,831 in property taxes
  • $60,660 in HOA dues
  • Total Cost for 3 years: $2,083,089

$57,864 a month has got to be the most expensive rental in town, hands down.

[Update: Oops, I originally forgot to include the interest payments on the $3 million in loans. We’ll assume that they were short term ARMs with rates 1.1 points below the 30-year average. I have now added the total interest payments to the above accounting.]

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