Remember when Penthouse 40B at Fifteen Central Park West was such a gloriously shiny token of our breathtaking real estate bubble? A certain foreigner--maybe a London-based investor--signed a contract in 2005 for the 5,276-square-foot, 14-foot-tall, 9.5-room, four-bedroom penthouse, and closed at the end of this April for $21.5 million. He took out a $14.5 million mortgage with JPMorgan Chase that same day, records show, which means it only cost $7 million cash. And within a few weeks the sprawl was on the market with Brown Harris Stevens for $80 million (see here for the deceased listing), just about four times the price of the condo.
It was the most expensive residential listing in New York City. And now it's gone.
"Coming off the market as of today," one of the listing brokers, Richard Wallgren, just told The Observer. "The owner is deciding what to do with the apartment, whether to move in, whether to sell it later. It's off the market."
