Empty Nesters Find 2nd Perch in New York
By JOSEPH BERGER
Published: March 5, 2006
Once a pied-à-terre had a whiff of rarefied wealth, suggestive of an apartment kept by a well-traveled European baron, a Hollywood star or even a Greenwich, Conn., mogul who might use it to stash such amenities as a mistress.
But while second homes have always represented a sliver of the New York City real estate market, sales in this category are booming, and the surge is being driven to a surprising degree, realtors say, by a relatively new breed of buyer: hard-working, middle-aged suburbanites.
The 2000 Census indicated that the number of apartments in Manhattan used as second homes had increased 141 percent to 21,640 over the previous decade, and the Census Bureau's 2004 American Community Survey, based on a smaller sampling, showed the number of second homes in Manhattan soaring even more, to 30,780. Real estate brokers say the figures have spiked in recent years as more baby boomers become empty-nesters and contemplate a move to the city.
The people likely to own these hideaways are usually two-income couples whose suburban house has soared in price and who use the resulting equity to take out a loan to buy a Manhattan flat. From there, they can lap up the culture they starved for while raising the children.
"The baby boomers are on their second childhoods when their kids get out, which is a different attitude than their parents had," said Dottie Herman, chief executive of Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate. "In the suburbs, most of life is about the PTA's. Then all of a sudden the kids are older and they're in their early 50's, and they still have life and they want to go back to the city."
These boomers might have simply gritted their teeth and driven back after an evening out on Broadway, but in many cases failing eyesight and a less patient disposition make drives back to Chappaqua or Short Hills less tolerable. At the same time, they are not quite ready to give up suburban friends and suburban pleasures, like golf and a backyard barbecue.
Richard and Joyce DeMatteis, both in their early 50's and bred-in-the-bone New Yorkers who moved to Suffolk County to raise their children, bought their East Side one-bedroom for less than $400,000 in 2002 so Mr. DeMatteis could stop commuting two hours each way to his Midtown company and be able to enjoy dinner out and the theater more often.
"I like the city because it's alive," said Ms. DeMatteis, a homemaker whose husband is an executive at a cosmetics company. "You walk everywhere. There's always something going on. It's night and day from Long Island."
On the other hand, they were not ready to give up the house, where they had raised their two children and where they had all their prize trinkets.
"I'm too young and too old at the same time," Ms. DeMatteis explained. "I'm too old to pack up a big house and buy another big house at this stage in my life, and I'm too young to retire."
Pamela Liebman, chief executive of the Corcoran Group, whose broker Rebecca Knaster sold the DeMatteises their apartment, said that some builders were designing apartment houses for this "huge" market, tucking in a large proportion of one-bedrooms and such amenities as a concierge to order theater tickets. The new 60-story Orion on West 42d Street, she said, has drawn a "huge number of pied-à-terre buyers."
According to the city's Department of Planning, the best statistics, while not up to date, are the census numbers for homes in Manhattan listed as held "for seasonal, recreational or occasional use." In 1990 there were 8,967 such units. In 2000, there were 21,640, a jump of 141.3 percent. On the West Side, which had 2,788 such apartments, the increase was 204.7 percent, and on the East Side, with 6,663, there was a 114.7 percent rise.
Some buy a second home to be close to grown children who work in New York. David Lang, 62, who retired as a Bell Laboratories scientist but still works as a consultant, and his wife, Susan, a doctor for the city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, bought an Upper West Side apartment in 1999 so their daughter, Cindy, could live there while in graduate school.
But in the back of his mind was the idea that he and his wife would take it over and be close to her and their sons, both of whom were working in New York at the time. They eventually moved in, holding on to their New Jersey house so they could play golf on weekends.
"When you live in New Jersey, it's such a hassle coming in and doing anything — parking and blah blah," he said.
They put up with it for the children, he said, but the pleasures of suburban life waned for them when the children grew up.
"Suburban life is great with small kids," he added. "There are sports and school activities — it's really quite nice." But now he said, "On a day I'm not working I can go over to the museum and have brunch."
Ben Forsyth and his wife, Elizabeth, both native New Yorkers who worked as professors of medicine and then retired, spent Sunday, Feb. 12, searching for a place in Park Slope. That's where his son and daughter live. He will have a particularly long commuting time.
His main residence is in Phoenix. But his daughter is a doctor of infectious diseases at Mount Sinai Medical Center and his son is in graduate school in music technology at New York University, so they want to be near them for a week or more at a time.
"We'll use it for a week of theater and museums every few months," he said. "Given the hassle of hotels and the expense of hotels it seems like a sensible investment." They eventually bid more than half a million dollars for a one-bedroom in a prewar apartment house in Park Slope.
There are downsides, of course. Manhattan kitchens never seem to match the so-called great rooms of the suburbs. Ms. Herman of Douglas Elliman said co-op boards — as opposed to those managing condominiums — have sometimes frowned on buyers seeking pieds-à-terre, preferring permanent residents and worrying that such apartments will become crash pads for the children.
Sometimes husband and wife may not have the same passion about moving to Manhattan. Jeffrey Sinaw, who owns a Manhattan graphics company, has eagerly awaited ending his commuting from Short Hills, N.J., and taking in the streets of New York, and bought a two-bedroom apartment at Sutton Place.
"I am looking forward to having the energy for New York, being entertained, being able to entertain in my home in the city again, re-establishing my friendships," he said.
But he acknowledges that his wife, Celine, a teacher, is more drawn to Short Hills, where she has friends and where they belong to a country club, and that she will spend more of the week out there.
"She's going to transition into the city," he said.
Life also has a way of dealing a wild card. Last year, Mr. DeMatteis was transferred to his firm's Long Island office in Melville. They kept the apartment, but are mostly hunkered down in Suffolk County, traveling in for a Manhattan evening once or twice a month. Still, they love Manhattan so much, they are thinking of keeping the apartment and trading the Long Island house for a retirement home in Florida.
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