Even the rooms you rent out have full-service private kitchens and a dining room table for 12 so you can host a private dinner party.” For the last 10 years, outdoor spaces with pools were nothing new, but now there’s fire pits, individual pods so more than one family can be outside grilling at the same time with surround sound speakers. All of the amenities that once were, are taken up a notch. “You’re really talking about service as a part of luxury. “It’s almost like a hotel concept,” Browne and Morris explained. In high-rise new-construction buildings, buyers want a concierge to handle everything from making dinner reservations to buying theater tickets.
Formal dining rooms have made a comeback, and dual home offices, white and airy kitchens with sleek lines, hidden refrigerators and countertops made of soapstone and quartzite - not granite - are in demand as well. Morris’ personal favorite: a wine refrigerator with a three-bottle wine dispenser that keeps an open bottle of wine fresh for three months.īrowne and Morris said buyers also want green homes outfitted with geothermal heating systems, technology to control lights and curtains with a press of a button and biophilic designs that bring the outdoors inside via floor-to-ceiling NanaWalls. Lately, buyers want the same features and amenities in their new-construction homes that are available in high-rise condos: harder-working kitchens, more built-ins, warming drawers - a thing of the past that has returned - convection ovens, separate areas for coffee stations and wine and cheese bars, and multifunctional appliances. Most often, it’s some sort of hybrid of the two, Browne and Morris explained. It can be amenities and features, or it can also mean new construction. No question, luxury is a subjective experience it means something different to each person, according to agents Michelle Browne and Naja Morris of the MB Team at | Christie’s International Real Estate. If they don’t feel those things going into a property, they’re going to move on.” It might be the view, the location and certainly the finishes. Whether Nugent is assisting buyers in the market for a $500,000 home or a $5 million property, she said they all desire the same thing: “Buyers need to feel the value proposition. It gets harder to find unless sellers have kept up with design trends.” “People want to surround themselves in beauty right away and live, whether it’s a penthouse high-rise in the city or a magnificent Lake Forest estate. “Luxury today is an experience,” said Nancy Nugent, senior vice president at Jameson Sotheby’s International Realty. While she sees many buyers make cash purchases, she said it’s still possible to obtain a good rate on a jumbo mortgage - mid-March, the average rate was 4.9%. To have a home is a good inflation hedge.” “People have more equity today … They’re putting money in hard assets, particularly now that we’re seeing inflation. “Economist Marci Rossell said the average American, pre-pandemic, was saving about 8% of their income post-pandemic they’re saving 12% of their income,” Rossley noted. Rossley attributes it to households saving more money now than they did pre-pandemic and choosing real estate as a safer investment than the stock market. Interestingly, ultra-luxury is outpacing luxury in general: 31 properties over $5 million sold last year in Chicago versus nine homes in 2020 - an increase of 244%. In Chicago, sales in the $1 million-plus category were up 56% in 2021, and the trend continues today, Rossley noted. Sales reboundĭespite the 2020 exodus from the city, buyers are coming back, according to Anne Rossley, a Realtor with Baird & Warner. Sellers must now make their properties move-in ready or risk playing the waiting game.Ĭhicago Agent recently spoke to luxury brokers about what’s trending in the marketplace, millennial and boomer preferences, the shift back to the city, which neighborhoods are the most desirable and how long they expect the market to stay hot. No longer willing to remodel, they want turnkey, or they will immediately search elsewhere, according to agents working this sector of the market. With mask mandates lifted, vaccines readily available and life slowly returning to “normal,” city dwellers who headed to the North Shore to social distance are now returning, and they’re looking for lakefront properties.Ĭabin fever, time to rethink priorities and the money saved during lockdown have given those in the luxury market increased buying power, as well as new priorities about the lifestyle they want to lead. It’s as if the clouds have parted and the sun is shining on the luxury market.
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