New York’s Fanciest Free Houses Belong to Organizations
Shortly after Katy Clark stepped down as president of the Brooklyn Academy of Music earlier this year, the New York Time reported that she took with her a $ 1.9 million pre-war three-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment overlooking Prospect Park, which the BAM purchase helped facilitate in the form of a housing premium of nearly $ 968,000. It turns out that Clark’s home layout was not unique. In New York, a city where even the darkest studio on the Upper West Side can cost as much as $ 750,000, suspended housing – in some cases both free and tax-free – is a long-standing practice, used to attract (and retain) everyone from the principals of private schools to the head of the zoo’s parent organization. Bronx.
Real estate and tax records reveal that a number of organizations, from universities and private schools to cultural institutions, have bought or donated everything from a $ 4 million Cobble Hill townhouse to an imposing Victorian Gothic house in the Fieldston neighborhood of the Bronx, which rulers can use during their tenure. (Clark’s case, in that she was able to keep the house after she left, is less common.) And while some organizations have started to offload these units in recent years to keep costs down, like the Metropolitan Museum of Art recently did so with its Fifth Avenue Apartment that has housed museum executives for decades, the practice of softening a housing supply – and providing organization leaders with a framework for chatting with donors – disappearing anytime soon. “It’s just standard procedure for attracting top people,” says John Casey, professor of nonprofit management at Baruch College.
In 2010, to seduce Vincent Tompkins, then vice-chancellor of Brown University, to the post of principal of Saint Ann’s School, the private school of Brooklyn purchased this Cobble Hill Townhouse for $ 3.8 million for the headteacher and his family.
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The property, a two-and-a-half-story Victorian Gothic house with an adjoining tower dating from the late 19th century, served as the site for the Riverdale Country Day School. For decades, it served as the home of the principal of the Bronx Preparatory School.
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Three years after Fr. David O’Halloran joined Saint David’s School on the Upper East Side as principal, the New York Observer reported that the boys-only prep school purchased two adjacent fifth-floor condos in the Philip Johnson metro area – many condos would contain three or four bedrooms – which were to be combined into one unit for O’Halloran and his family.
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Although the American Museum of Natural History already had a $ 2.2 million apartment on West 79th Street, which had housed its former president, according to the Time, the museum sold the apartment after Futter became president of the in 1993 with a loss of $ 250,000 and purchased an East Side simplex unit at 79 East 79th Street.
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In 2004, MoMA bought a $ 6 million apartment in the museum tower on its campus for its director. The post-war building has a rooftop terrace, concierge service and a fitness center.
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For decades, museum executives could call a cooperative on the second floor of Fifth Avenue owned by the museum. But just a year after Daniel Weiss officially took over from Thomas P. Campbell as CEO, the Met sold their unit for $ 5.6 million amid financial tightening.
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In 2008, Carnegie Hall purchased a 3,335-square-foot, four-bedroom condo, with a bespoke aquarium, at Barbizon / 63 for $ 8.4 million, for its executive and artistic director Clive Gillinson and his wife, Anya. , reside and charm donors, the Observer reported. But due to the delicate timing of buying a luxury condo coinciding with the end of the Great Recession, Gillinson reportedly waited to move into the space. (A spokesperson says he finally moved in in 2010.)
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As president and CEO of the organization that oversees the Bronx, Central Park, Prospect Park and Queens Zoo, as well as the New York Aquarium, Cristián Samper resided in an apartment owned by the Wildlife Conservation Society in an Italian Renaissance palace on the Upper East Side. building designed by architect Costas Kondylis. All of the apartments in the building (which has a fitness center, 24-hour doorman, and game room) have (at least) 9-foot ceilings. Bronx Zoo Director Jim Breheny lived in company-owned accommodation on the zoo grounds.
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Serving as the residence of the Swedish Consul General, the 10,000 square foot building has 100 feet of frontage on Park Avenue. The center of the house has a long, half-elliptical staircase hall, and all of its rooms – which are filled with furniture from Swedish designers like Josef Frank – have windows facing the avenue.
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In return for opening and closing the city-owned King Manor (and not collecting a salary), Fox has lived rent-free for more than 30 years in the 22,000-square-foot historic monument, according to the new York To post.
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A six-bedroom, four-bathroom apartment on the 11th floor at 550 Park Avenue served as the president’s residence until 2018, when the church purchased a 39th floor unit at 135 West 52nd Street.
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During her 26-year tenure as Senior Minister at Judson Memorial Church, Reverend Donna Schaper, who retired last May, lived in a four-story, two-unit Gramercy Park townhouse. belonging to the church.
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The three-and-a-half-story Gothic Revival Rectory, designed by cathedral architect James Renwick Jr., has housed members of the clergy since the 1880s. A recent renovation has included updates to the priests’ residences and a new kitchen stainless steel, to the delight of the rector of the church. “I am a cook,” said Monsignor Ritchie Catholic New York, “but I would never cook anything in the old kitchen.”
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The president of International House and his family are offered an apartment in the internationally oriented dormitory which houses more than 700 postgraduate students in order to promote its mission of “both fortuitous and intentional interaction between its residents,” according to a spokesperson.
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Completed in 1912 and designed by architectural firm McKim, Mead and White – responsible for fine arts icons like the Brooklyn Museum and the original Penn Station – the brick and limestone President’s House underwent a $ 23 million renovation. which ended in 2005. (This required Bollinger to live in a number of temporary housing, which he “described as one of the most miserable times of his life”, according to at Time.)
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Since starting his tenure as NYU president in 2016, Andrew Hamilton has lived in a 4,200-square-foot university-owned duplex penthouse overlooking Washington Square Park, with four bedrooms, four and a half baths, and a rooftop. -terrace. . Speak Time, the space underwent a renovation costing at least $ 1.1 million.
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Due to the losses caused by the pandemic, CUNY is marketing the presidential residences of the College of Staten Island and Medgar Evers College. Bugle reported that the university is also considering selling the presidential residences at Baruch College, Lehman College, Queens College and Brooklyn College.
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