Your private bar at 200 Guards Road…all you need is friends to visit you! Opening ask, $27,895,000, reduced to $22,250,000, now has a deal. List: Fran Ehrlich. Sell: Dancy Cassell.
Brokers should not, I feel, attempt to specialize in any particular category of real estate. Don’t go telling people you’re a damned “waterfront specialist”, “condo expert”, “Riverside broker”, etc. Nope, say no to specializing, take whatever the hell comes over the transom, and sell it!
In other words, keep track of the entire market and be ready to help someone no matter where in town they want to buy. It may well turn out that most of what you sell is indeed in one part of town, or in one category of real estate, that’s fine, but don’t try and do it deliberately, got it?
So when blogger Chris Fountain texted me yesterday, asking about a property in Conyers Farm, I was brought up short with the realization that I’d lost track of an important part of the market! I was very familiar with the property he asked about, but I did not instantly know the recent sales up there. I’d broken the Gid Fountain cardinal rule: Know The Whole Market!
So how’s Conyers doing these days? It turns out, very, very well! Six sales in six months, ranging from $3,800,000, all the way up to the latest pending deal with an asking price of $22,250,000.
Here’s a link to those six sales in six months: Conyers Farm recent deals.
200 Guards Road, last ask $22,250,000.
75 Conyers Farm Drive, closed a few weeks ago for $8,838,000.
53 Lower Cross Road, closed in August for $7,550,000.
32 Lower Cross Road, under contract…
24 Lower Cross Road, closed December, 2015 for $5,250,000.
2 Cowdray Park Drive, possibly the bargain of the century…
Sold in 1999 for $8,900,000 and has now sold again, this time for $3,800,000.
Greenwich Bored And Razed 
Um, shouldn’t you edit this to read “Backcountry is Selling Again, for 50% off.”
Yes, there are sales…but aren’t the prices weak?
Cobbs:
No, I disagree (as usual!). 200 Guards, built in 2004, hasn’t sold before. 75 Conyers, has sold previously for $10.750M, then $5.125M, now $8.838M. 53 Lower Cross hasn’t sold before. 32 Lower Cross hasn’t sold before. 24 Lower Cross hasn’t sold before. 2 Cowdray Park, sold previously for $8.9M, then $4.199M, now $3.8M BUT, it is in tired, dated condition, so that low price isn’t much of a surprise for a THIRTY year old house!
But Dudester, how do these prices compare to accessed value during the 2008-2015 valuation? While crude, that is the index these titans of capital are measuring their success or failure against. I know a guy who says his Conyers house was worth $14-$16MM at the height of the market, and today he thinks he could only get $8 for it.
CobCos:
I don’t subscribe to the “I know a guy” method of real estate evaluation.
Bro, pointing out that houses are clocking in at 60% (75%) of peak assessment in back country is not a ‘know a guy method,’ it’s reality.
As for the guy I know, he wants to sell, but is in no rush to recognize the loss.
Cause Crab:
Dude! What a silly little discussion this is. Buyers are once again choosing to spend MILLIONS for backcountry properties that hitherto seemed unsaleable. That is good news.Whatever valuation the town of Greenwich assessed them at is practically irrelevant.
Selling well below replacement costs or peak valuation is extremely relevant, even to the wealthy. I just remembered, there were three people in my conversation last week, two of whom wish to sell their back country homes, one in Conyers and one up off upper Lake. Both have $12-15MM homes that they now think will fetch $8-$10 – if they are lucky. Therefore, neither plan to list anytime soon.
Btw, your pricing/sales history below is alarming; 10.75, then 5, now 8. Congrats on the 8, but wow.
Cos Cobber:
Back around 1900, a wealthy fellow built a mansion in Greenwich’s backcountry. Its cost at the time was said to be about $1,000,000. Imagine that amount in today’s dollars, what would it be, $100M? $200M? Anyway, a few decades later, it sold for $75,000. The lesson? There is no lesson! People pour money into properties here, and in other wealthy towns, and often times they don’t get that money back. What shall we do about this terrible situation?
“…blogger [??] Chris Fountain…”
RivRant:
Why, yes, ever heard of the fellow?
Who?
Ant:
Oh, come now! Surely you recognize the name! You know, that blogger fellow, writes about real estate and such…
Anon:
Wow, the ultimate “inside” joke…
I guess it is not that hard, there is a price for everything and finally Conyers and other back country properties are clearing at lower prices than in the past. It is the new reality. For new buyers there is great value in back country.
Anon:
That sounds good, but I don’t agree. These latest prices are VERY good, perhaps as good as they could have been in 2007. No, the change I’m pointing out is the DESIRE for backcountry. For quite a while, it has looked as though the fashion had changed for good, everyone wanted to be “downtown” or close to it. These recent deals indicate the death of backcountry was greatly exaggerated…(apologies to Mark Twain).
well I defer to you, you have more knowledge than me, but I will say that as a downtown transplant who used to live in back country I was driving around the area the other day for the first time in nearly a year and I had forgotten how beautiful it is, especially in spring
Oh yes, I think he caught a crab in the Yale-Harvard race.