Millennium Tower (Filene's) | 426 Washington Street | Downtown

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617 said:
Is this tower THAT much nicer than the W condos or 45 province? If I remember correctly those two lagged on the market and took forever to sell out, the W even filed bankruptcy. There has to be something else going on here.
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Based on renderings, 100% yes. W condos have horrible layouts and it's right next to majority of Boston's night clubs, which means pukefest on Friday and Saturday. 45 Province is really tiny. Their lobby, their valet entrance, swimming pool, etc..everything is tiny. Boston currently doesn't have a tower with the same caliber as Millennium Tower.
 
vanshnookenraggen said:
All millionaires are not the same. There have only been a few buildings of this caliber built in Boston, and it just so happens that Millennium has built a lot of them. The other condo/rental buildings are not aimed at millionaires but sub-millionaires and are pretty basic in terms of services and design. There is an upper echelon market which Boston is only beginning to enter. New York has been there, obviously, but even the ultra-lux towers going up now (the super tall ones) are new to that market.

Look around what's been built in Boston over the last decade and you actually don't see ultra luxury buildings. Archstone and their ilk aren't that fancy in the grand scheme of things. Sure you need to make $100,000 to live there but that's hardly $1,000,000 a year; that's a huge difference. The fact is there isn't much available to this level of buyer that isn't a mansion in Brookline. And that's where these people are coming from, the wealthy suburbs and the new tech/biotech money. There is also demand from international buyers who want a place for their kid to live when they send them to Harvard or MIT. A lot of this is investment, not for a primary residence.

And look what's in the pipeline, 1 Dalton and the Copely Plaza Tower, these are the ones that are trying to enter the same market.
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Van -- the standard definition of a Millionaire is having readily disposable assets of one million -- i.e. ex your house

So there are 3 ways to become a Millionaire:
  • 1 inherit the assets -- e.g. Kennedy's
  • 2 work hard for a while -- If you are reasonably frugal [a traditional yankee trait] you can easily accumulate $1M with an income in the mid hundred k$ per year in a decade or so
  • 3 get there in one jump by being part of a successful entrepreneurial venture which goes public or sells out

As New England has had rich folks for generations, has lots of professionals and others making good income and essentially invented Venture Capital -- there are thousands of people in this situation living in Greater Boston

Wellesley is a town of 27,982 with all 3 categories of Millionaires in the 3rd richest state in the US according to the US Census

By comparison Wellesley, MA, US

Wellesley MA US
Per capita money income in past 12 months (2013 dollars), 2009-2013 $72,046 $35,763 $28,155
Median household income, 2009-2013 $159,167 $66,866 $53,046
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As they leave the having college age kids era behind -- and perhaps even semi-retire the 2 to 5 acres of lawn in Wellesley or Weston might look like a liability rather than its role for the past few decade as a big if not liquid asset -- so you trade the $3M house for a $3M condo downtown where you don't have to take the train or drive to the MFA or the BSO

On the other hand -- having an income of $1M is typically associated with someone worth at least $10M or so -- a considerably rarer situation -- but still there are hundreds who could buy the Millenium Uber Penthouse if they wanted to be so conspicuous
 
45 Province is like Section 8 housing compared to Millennium Tower, lol.
 
whighlander said:
On the other hand -- having an income of $1M is typically associated with someone worth at least $10M or so -- a considerably rarer situation -- but still there are hundreds who could buy the Millenium Uber Penthouse if they wanted to be so conspicuous
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Don't forget condo fees in a building like this. Those run $1-$1.5/sqft. So lets ballpark the condo fees for the top floor at $15k a MONTH. That's $180K per year in condo fees.
 
617 said:
Is this tower THAT much nicer than the W condos or 45 province? If I remember correctly those two lagged on the market and took forever to sell out, the W even filed bankruptcy. There has to be something else going on here.
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marketing, marketing, marketing. Plus the W and 45 Province units came on the market during a completely different economic climate.
 
They might not have been 5-6 years can result in pretty big changes in income level and overall wealth especially for recent college graduates working in the tech and biotech fields.
 
617 said:
So these people weren't rich 5-6 years ago?
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The recession really hurt pocketbooks and possibly played into it slightly, but I'd say the driving factor of why 45 Province didn't sell until recently and the W never sold (still is empty) is because of locations. Back during the recession, DTX wasn't a very pleasant place to be, let alone live. There was a giant hole in the ground, empty lots (Hayward Pl), empty storefronts, and not as many residents. DTX rebounded in a big way (Millennium Place III, specifically) and I'd suspect that the people who bought recently at 45 Province are excited about the future of DTX. The tower is going up, Burnham building is semi-alive, Cafe Nero, Legal, etc.

The W on Stuart is a different story. It's just not a desirable location for the caliber of living the W tried to capture. The area just has a strange vibe.
 
pixelsand8 said:
Slowly starting to push it's way into the downtown skyline;

3H7cTT8.jpg
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45 province is such a fuck you from this angle. I am repeatedly stunned every time I see it from the river or the common. Like the other sides of it, but that grey wall is so visible and so awful, and probably will never be obscured by anything else.
 
datadyne007 said:
The recession really hurt pocketbooks and possibly played into it slightly, but I'd say the driving factor of why 45 Province didn't sell until recently and the W never sold (still is empty) is because of locations. Back during the recession, DTX wasn't a very pleasant place to be, let alone live. There was a giant hole in the ground, empty lots (Hayward Pl), empty storefronts, and not as many residents. DTX rebounded in a big way (Millennium Place III, specifically) and I'd suspect that the people who bought recently at 45 Province are excited about the future of DTX. The tower is going up, Burnham building is semi-alive, Cafe Nero, Legal, etc.

The W on Stuart is a different story. It's just not a desirable location for the caliber of living the W tried to capture. The area just has a strange vibe.
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I would also add to this argument that another driving force is uncertainty. At the point, nobody really knew how far the economy was going to fall before it bottoms out. Playing safe would be to hedge all your money on stable assets, which at that moment, real estate was not among one of them. Things have changed since then.
 
FK4 said:
45 province is such a fuck you from this angle. I am repeatedly stunned every time I see it from the river or the common. Like the other sides of it, but that grey wall is so visible and so awful, and probably will never be obscured by anything else.
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I'd like to see a giant mural.
 
mdd said:
I'd like to see a giant mural.
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If they did it right it would be so totally ridiculous but awesome - i dont know of a skycraper/tower size mural in any city.

also, they could decorate it, put fake windows on it, anything...
 
FK4 said:
If they did it right it would be so totally ridiculous but awesome - i dont know of a skycraper/tower size mural in any city.

also, they could decorate it, put fake windows on it, anything...
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There is that hotel in LA where they put ads for movies on the entire tower, 3 towers across.

It's a condo building though. Maybe you could get some sort of banner strung on it, but your going to have to get the residents on board.
 
FK4 said:
If they did it right it would be so totally ridiculous but awesome - i dont know of a skycraper/tower size mural in any city.

also, they could decorate it, put fake windows on it, anything...
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It would be wonderful, and not totally unprecedented. I know of our own whale mural down the south end, then came across these examples...
P1050309+copy.jpg

whales.jpg


The first one is apparently in Detroit, not sure about the second.

Something could definitely be done, but it would probably be a bear to get approved.
 
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