HOTD: How Low Can the Pfizer Mansion Go?
The Pfizer mansion at 280 Washington Avenue has been on and off the market and all over the price map for almost two years now. The 12,000-square-foot mansion, which is dripping with restored period detail (a little over the top in come cases), started at $3,595,000 in January 2005 before going off the market a…
The Pfizer mansion at 280 Washington Avenue has been on and off the market and all over the price map for almost two years now. The 12,000-square-foot mansion, which is dripping with restored period detail (a little over the top in come cases), started at $3,595,000 in January 2005 before going off the market a few months later; then in February of this year, it burst back onto the scene at $3,995,000, only to be reduced a few months later to $3,695,000. And now last week it dropped by almost another 10% to $3,399,000. Where does it stop? As we’ve said before, it’s not very expensive on a per square foot basis. There just aren’t a lot of buyers looking to drop more than $3 mil on a place in Clinton Hill just yet.
280 Washington Avenue [Corcoran] GMAP P*Shark
House of the Day: 280 Washington Avenue [Brownstoner]
Pfizer Mansion Hitting Market [Brownstoner]
We offered them $2,750,000 all cash and they wouldn’t take it.
To live in this house you need 2 full time housekeepers at least and a gardener. The number of people willing and able to live that kind of lifestyle is extremely limited to begin with and I think that the vast majority of them prefer the upper east side where people of similar ilk live. Moving to a working class neighborhood (and not a very good one at that) seems unlikely for someone with that kind of mentality and financial wherewithal.
If this house were $500,000 I still couldn’t afford it just because being a working shmo myself (albeit a very well paid one), I am completely incapable of maintaining this house.
But, you know what they say – there is a lid for every pot.
The building next door, 266 Washington Ave, recently sold for $20 million. http://brownstoner.com/brownstoner/archives/2006/11/266_washington.html
With 13,000 sf of unused FAR, this is likely to become a construction site in the near future.
12:45, ALL would agree that Park Slope is better?? I’ll give you the schools, but I’d take Clinton Hill over Park Slope any day of the week.
Speaking of large overpriced home in Brooklyn. Anyone have any updates on the $3.8m brownstone on Washington Park. I was surfing the BHS website one day last week and noticed a price drop to $3.6m, must have been an error because when I went back the next day the price was back to the orginal $3.8m. Any gossip.
I would tend to agree that there are only a handful of people (if any) who would be willing to spend $3 for a place in CH. The asking price for this place could get you a park block renovated brownstone in Park Slope – which all would agree is a better nabe in terms of schools, services amenities etc. A buyer would have to have a special attached to CH or the house to be willing to make such a big financial commitment – this is heightened if we assume that the predictions of a down market are true.
Also at that asking price, I am not sure it would make sense for a developer to buy and convert. Even if a developer could create 1 apartment per floor and sell each for over $1, there would not be much room for a big profit.
I think it is languishing not because the price is outlandish for the size and provenance of the building, but because most families who buy in the area do not need a single family with 12,000 sq. feet (size of three large brownstones!). I hope someone does in the end as it would be nice for one of the old mansions to remain intact, and not be cut up into condos.
I always thought it was a gorgeous listing though. Given the size, would make a nice browndo or bro-op convert.
“There just aren’t a lot of buyers looking to drop more than $3 mil on a place in Clinton Hill just yet.”
And why not? They seem to drop $1.5M on brownstones half the size in need of renovations and without parking for even 1 car. Are things not what they seem? I guess it’s the 1-fam status.