Apartment rentals New York with West Chelsea

First conceived of in 2009, the Pier 57 makeover, located across from the Westside Highway at 15th Street, is finally underway. The first stage of the development, headed by developer YoungWoo and Associates, will take the form of a mall made of shipping containers. YoungWoo and Associates will set up shipping containers as stores for approximately 60 retailers with an expected completion date of this April. The Hudson River Park Board and community advocates chose Lot-Ek and YoungWoo as the designers for the new Pier 57 over competing designs from the Related Companies and the Durst Organization. What they liked about Lot-Ek and YoungWoo’s design was the provisions for green space, reductions in vehicular trips, and the respect for the pier’s industrial history. One of the only questions is whether or not rents will go up in West Chelsea again once the project is completed.

It’s an old story at this point, but if you’ve been following the Manhattan rental apartment market at all, you know the drill: vacancy is down, rents are up, new construction is scarce, and concessions are rare. Among the many explanations as to how we got here - and there are plenty - one of the most prominent is that Manhattan is a small island where space is limited, hence the lack of inventory. The reality is that this real estate platitude is a lazy way of analyzing our current market, one which obscures far more accurate explanations. For instance, the tight credit market for large new construction projects, government restrictions such as historic districts, and long-standing preconceived notions about certain Manhattan neighborhoods have a far greater influence on Manhattan’s rental apartment inventory than the size of the island.

How quickly we forget. 10 years ago, the High Line was a rusted artifact, a blight on West Chelsea, and a large part of the reason that West Chelsea remained underdeveloped and cheaper to rent in than Chelsea itself. West Chelsea has always been something of a separate neighborhood because of its industrial character, slightly out-of-the-way location, and cheap rents relative to the rest of Chelsea and other downtown neighborhoods. However, the High Line changed everything, and that’s not an exaggeration: Rents in West Chelsea now exceed rents in Chelsea, consequently pulling them upward and enhancing the neighborhood as a whole. In fact, rents for luxury apartments in West Chelsea have become similar to neighborhoods like SoHo and Tribeca, Manhattan's most expensive and coveted neighborhoods. Renters looking for great new luxury rentals should look to West Chelsea, because condo owners are cashing in on this sudden popularity by renting out their apartments, giving renters a unique opportunity to live in a neighborhood rich in culture and on the rise.