Tapping a booming market in metropolitan New York, owners of two of the newer luxury residential developments in Westchester County are offering corporate rental suites.
In Yonkers, Collins Enterprises, L.L.C., a national real estate company based in Stamford, Conn., is renting extended-stay suites at its Hudson Park luxury apartment complex on the riverfront. Collins recently signed 19 corporate leases with APX Alarm Co., a national security company based in Provo, Utah. The apartments will be occupied by the company”™s regional sales staff.
The fully furnished apartments rent from $2,950 to $3,200 per month for a one-bedroom unit to $3,450 to $3900 for a two-bedroom apartment. Rent includes bathroom and bedroom accessories and all utilities. Each apartment has its own washer and dryer, microwave, icemaker and refrigerator, dishwasher and garbage disposal. When available, the corporate suite rental includes one parking space.
Completed in 2003, Hudson Park South has 266 luxury apartments and 15,500 square feet of retail, restaurants and professional office space. Hudson Park North, scheduled for completion in December 2008, will feature 294 one- and two-bedroom apartments in two towers of 14 and 12 stories connected by a four-story building.
Amenities at Hudson Park include a health and fitness center, concierge, community rooms, and a business center. A 2-acre public riverfront esplanade is being built by Collins as part of the Hudson Park development. The complex has its own entrance to the newly renovated Metro-North train station.
Hudson Park is owned and managed by Collins Enterprises, a third-generation, private real estate company that owns and operates 1.3 million square feet of multifamily and commercial office buildings from Virginia to New York.
Although Hudson Park South is almost fully occupied, apartments could become available to corporations and other extended-stay renters as leases expire, said Rona Siegel, vice president of operations for Collins Properties.
“We”™re offering businesses the perfect turnkey solution to the problem of finding high-quality corporate housing that is easily accessible to Manhattan,” she said.
Siegel said the shortest-term lease to date for the Hudson Park suites has been three months. Stays of one month to 45 days could be accommodated there, she said.
For corporations, “I think this is a new avenue, especially since the occupancy in New York City has been 100 percent for the past two years,” Siegel said. “I think that allows looking at other options” outside the city.
“I think that”™s the wave of the future. I think this is basically a whole new area for the rental market,” Siegel said.
In downtown White Plains, corporations this month will begin signing leases for luxury atelier suites at The Residences at The Ritz-Carlton, said Jessica Rohm, senior managing director of sales and marketing at Valhalla-based Cappelli Enterprises Inc. Thirty-two luxury apartments, ranging from 1,000 square feet to 1,400 square feet, will be available for occupancy when the first of two 44-story condominium towers opens in mid-September, she said.
Corporations can choose from minimum-term leases of three months to annual and five-year leases, Rohm said. Monthly rents for the designer-furnished units range from $9,500 to $12,500. The extended-stay suites are on the seventh through 10th floors of the tower.
The suites come with all Ritz-Carlton hotel services and access to hotel facilities; a house account at two restaurants slated to open in the $500 million development and an additional 10 percent discount on the corporate rate at The Ritz-Carlton for companies with atelier leases of one year or longer.
“It”™s kind of a hybrid between a hotel and a condominium,” Rohm said.
Six major corporations with offices in Westchester County have indicated they will sign leases for the ateliers. “I don”™t expect them to last long,” she said.
The Cappelli tower will not be the first to accommodate corporate renters in downtown White Plains. Korman Communities, a company that for 40 years has provided short-term corporate suites, rents all of its 124 furnished apartments at 25 Martine Ave. to residents whose average stay is 60 to 90 days, said assistant manager Megan Kraus. Monthly rates range from $3,750 for a studio, $4,500 for a one-bedroom apartment and about $5,100 for a two-bedroom unit.
Kraus said demand “absolutely” is growing for the corporate suites, “especially during the summer months,” when relocated corporate employees are house hunting in the area. “Right now we”™re completely sold out. As soon as someone moves out, someone else moves in.”
At Bank Street Commons, the high-rise apartment complex at 15 Bank St. in White Plains, about 10 percent of its 502 apartments are leased by third-party corporate providers, said Karyn A. DiSalvo, property manager for Riverstone Residential Group.
Those companies typically sign long-term leases, usually 12 months, for unfurnished apartments, then furnish and rent them to corporations or individuals looking for short-term housing. Usually, those corporate housing companies include parking, utilities, housekeeping and other services in the monthly rent they charge clients, DiSalvo said.Â
In Westchester County, those competing corporate providers include Churchill Corporate Services; Oakwood Worldwide; Pasha Corporate Housing and Equity Corporate Housing. The last is a division of Equity Residential, the largest owner of apartments in the U.S. with more than 200,000 units.
Other competitors in the county”™s corporate suite market include The Esplanade Hotel and Corporate Housing in White Plains and the Residence Inn by Marriott in New Rochelle.
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