It's Season 3 of Million Dollar Listing New York, where three brokers, Fredrik Eklund, Luis Ortiz, and Ryan Serhant, show the world what it takes to sell high-priced New York City apartments. Check in each week for recaps by Angela Bunt. Episode air date: 5/7/2014
After seemingly removing all of the "bad energy" from Ryan's ancient townhouse listing at 115 East 35th Street, the Murray Hill mansion is finally garnering some interest on the market. Ryan's showings are picking up in frequency, and the episode begins with a potential buyer ooo-ing and aaa-ing over the old, historic hardware in the place.
Meanwhile, back at Tribeca's sexiest penthouse at 101 Warren, Fredrik is still bickering with Zeke over a fair price for the fully-furnished apartment. Zeke won't budge from his $11 million+furniture price, but agrees to let Freddy take inventory of all the furnishings in the house to check its true worth.
Luis is like, "Gay? You mean, like, happy?"
Luis gets dragged along by a friend to Ian Reisner's house for a "talent show." Ian, a big shot real estate developer, takes great joy in teasing Luis: he repeatedly tells him he looks like a young Ricky Ricardo (to the point where it starts to feel a little racist), and keeps asking him if he's sure he's not gay. Normally, I'd give Luis flack for not knowing who Ricky Ricardo is, but he's already being picked on enough here.
For the rest of the night, Luis endures getting hit on, getting his sexuality questioned, and getting publicly embarrassed by Ian as Ian forces a wig on his head and a microphone in his hand for the talent portion of the evening.
Ryan finally gets a hold of the elusive Patricia, owner of the baby doll-head-filled 35th Street mansion, to tell her about an initial offer they've received on the Murray Hill townhouse. While lower than desired at $3.75 million, Ryan wants to draw up the contract and use it as leverage for a bidding war, but will anybody else take the bait?
Fredrik and his faithful assistant Jordan are back at 101 Warren to take inventory on all of Zeke's prized possessions. Chandeliers, couches, carpets... Fredrik rattles things off to J, telling him to make a "database" (known to us norms as an excel doc) of the items and prices, due tomorrow morning. No, Jordan, he doesn't care that tomorrow is Saturday. As Freddy says, "The devil is in the details," and in this case, details equals furniture value.
"Bidding war, bitches!!!"
Back at Nest Seekers, Int'l., Ryan has his $3.75 million contract drawn up, but is having a hard time finding a second buyer to kick off his bidding war. Or is he? Olivia (digging the highlights, girl) tells him to check his email, where an offer for $3.9 million is sitting in his inbox.
Jordan and Fredrik are hard at work at the office, presumably on a Saturday, going over the inventory numbers. Turns out Zeke did spend a hefty $800,000 on all the furnishingssurprise! Freddy calls Zach to level with him about the price of the furniture, and Zach makes a whopping counter offer of... $100,000 (plus the $11 million for the penthouse). Still $700,000 short of what Zeke will accept. Le sigh. Will Fredrik ever get them to see eye to eye on the price of the most fabulous penthouse in all of Tribeca? Or will the deal be ruptured by old rugs? Busted by beds? Lambasted by lamps? You get my point.
Ian invites Luis over to his property at 230 Central Park South for a date – I mean, tour. Luis eyes grow wide as he's taken around the 3,200-square-foot apartment, all the while being hurled casual racist and overtly sexual remarks: "Are you Cuban? Puerto Rican? Eh, same thing," and "Yea, you're straight. Straight enough to get into my bed." While Luis earlier said he would do everything and anything (hrrmm, anything?) to get the apartment, this is going a little too far. When Ian reveals that this particular apartment is not the one for sale, he nearly goes bananas. But Ian's plans for Luis are a bit more ambitious: he wants him to sell a large four-bedroom combo apartment being built from four old units on the 11th floor.
To Luis's dismay, the apartment at 11B is a far cry from the beauty that Ian initially showed Luis. Seven-hundred square-feet, terrible wallpaper, mice... it's almost like a normal New Yorker's apartment. The others11A/F and 11Caren't as bad, but Ian's terrible attitude is certainly not helping. And the fact that his dog pees on the rug mid-showing? Also not helping.
The two debate the price, finally deciding to list it at $11.95 million, with the agreement that it will likely sell closer to $11 million. That's fine with Ian, as he still has one more trick up his sleeve for Luis: There is already a potential buyer that Ian has exclusivity forthat means, if said buyer wants the property, Luis would receive no commission. Upset, but ever-determined, Luis agrees.
It's the night of Derek's first art exhibition in New York, and Freddy couldn't be prouder. In fact, he's even able to put his talents to use as he helps hock Derek's paintings like hot cakes. But while Freddy is slinging his honey's artwork, he overhears D telling a friend that they've decided to put the surrogate hunt "on the back burner." Wha-whaaat? Confused and hurt, Fredrik confronts Derek in the bathroom, ultimately heading back into the party with nothing resolved.
Ryan manages to put all his "Bidding War, Bitches!" excitement on hold long enough to head over to the Sky Garage on Eleventh Avenue in West Chelsea. Construction on the one-of-a-kind penthouse is complete, which means he can finally film his epic commercial. (For those unaware, said commercial debuted just the other day.) To let the city know that Ryan Serhant is in da' housewell, at least 'da penthousehe installs huge purple florescent lights that glow in the window.
Ryan's epic bidding war has finally come to an end, and he meets feisty Patricia at her Murray Hill mansion to give her the good news: an offer of $4 million, all-cash. Oh, and he finally asks her what the deal was with all those doll heads in the basement. Apparently she's an artist and uses them for her sculpturesreal life baby sculptures!?!? Oh well, who cares? Consider this case: closed.
Renderings for Ian's new 11th floor development on Central Park South need to be created, and Ian insists that they use his architect for the job. At $25,000, Luis feels the price for photo-realistic renderings is much too high. Until Ian jumps in: "In the last few months, I got my brokers' license and I plan on being your co-exclusive on this listing, and taking half the commission."
As distraught as Fredrik is over Derek's indecision about having a child, business must go on. The only way he can hammer out the deal between Zachy and Zeekie is by getting the two to sit down man to man and come to an agreement.
It seems that everything in the apartment has depreciated by about 50 percent, which means that instead of costing $800,000 for all the furnishings, they're only worth $400,000. But can they get Zach to come up $300,000 from his original $100,000 offer?
Back at Casa de Serhant, girlfriend Emilia is pretending to make a salad while Ryan is pretending to listen to her talk about her family. Emilia is aghast when Ryan doesn't even remember her sister's name, and even more-so when he says he has no free time to see her next week. It seems he has no interest in having a meaningful relationship with anything besides an apartment listing, and squirms uncomfortably at the mere thought of sharing an intimate conversation with another human.
"My name is Ryan. I was born in Texas, grew up outside of Boston, and I'm a real estate agent in the city now... who throws myself unapologetically into my work to make up for the fact that I'm dead inside. I think that money can fill up the giant hole in my heart caused by my high school girlfriend dumping me for the prom king back in 1997, but in reality I don't know if I can ever love again."
Ryan seems to have forgotten to mention that he's also a failed actor. The conversation reaches its breaking point when Emilia says, "You're going to have to open up a little bit... you're going to have to try." Ryan finally screeches, "I don't want to TALK ABOUT IT," as if a four-year-old boy was talking back to his mother while angrily stamping his feet. Emilia cusses and storms out of the apartment. Don't let the door hit ya' where the good Lord split ya', sister girl.
Tensions are high as Zeke and Zach both play hard to get re: 101 Warren furniture deal. After a pep talk from Freddy, Zeke finally agrees to sell all of the furniture for $250,000 plus the $11 million penthouse price, and Zach agrees. In Freddy's words: "Weeeeee!!!"
· Official site: Million Dollar Listing [Bravo]
· All Million Dollar Listing New York recaps [Curbed]
Loading comments...