What Makes Luxury Real Estate...Luxurious?

We created this article with both buyers and sellers in mind, in an effort to avoid misunderstandings, bruised ego, and delayed or cancelled transaction. Below I’ve listed a number often misunderstood features and items that both sides of a Luxury Real Estate transaction should keep in mind when determining a realistic listing price or offer price for a truly luxurious home.

What is (and isn’t) the ideal luxury location? America’s most highly sought after locations feature an uncommon blend of three distinctly different attributes: A view, a sense of safety and serenity, and believe it or not, good old fashioned practicality.  There’s nothing sexy about practicality, but it’s valuable none the less.  Properties lacking any one of these elements will never capture the high ‘dollar-per-square-foot’ list price of a home that proudly boast all three of them. 

Unique Architectural Design: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, true, but which architectural styles fetch the highest price in today’s luxury real estate market?  There’s a simple, almost boring answer to this question but it’s an important one. The most valuable homes are simply the homes that most people like! With the highest demand; the more people who are willing and able to buy your home, the higher the sales price. It’s that simple. Unique, striking, and dynamic architecture is a plus for sure, but keep in mind that when the day comes that you want to sell…”Striking and Dynamic” might be not translate to a “Loved By All” bidding war!  

The most valuable properties don’t just possess striking Interior and exterior designs. The design and style must be durable as well. By durable, I don’t mean that the structure can withstand a hurricane or an earthquake, but durable in a sense of “timelessness.” That timelessness ensure that you’re home property will never truly be “out of style”.  Modestly sized, mid-century homes by designers like Wallace Neff and Hal Levitt occasionally sell for over $10 million. I’d call that timeless value.

What’s not Luxury? The clichéd McMansion; just another big house.  5,600 sq. ft. doesn’t make a home luxurious. It just makes it big. America is still reeling from the effects of its unquenchable thirst for size. Tract home developers churned out millions of “Luxury Estates” which really amounted to a bunch of big, poorly specified and poorly crafted big boxes with fancy names.  Yes, size matters.  But size and luxury don’t have to walk hand in hand.  Fine things come in small packages as well. 

One last point about architectural design.  Don’t confuse architecture with design style or even a home’s décor.  Architecture is, for all intents and purposes, permanent.  Homeowners can simply and cost effectively update and upgrade a home’s finishes. Updating the painting and flooring is easy enough. Kitchens and Bathrooms are a bit more involved. But unless you’re a developer or a general contractor, make sure you love the “Sticks & Bricks” of the Luxury Home that you’re buying.  Changing a home’s architecture can become a monumental task.  Moving interior or exterior walls, making room additions, and reconfiguring rooms, with all of the complications of engineering, permits, plumbing, and electrical can be cost prohibitive, or at least a bad investment. Luxury architecture: It’s unique.  It’s custom.  It’s artistic. It’s inspired.

Design.  Whether buying or selling, don’t fret too much current the current design detail of the home. Real estate stylings and décor share the same vicious cycle as fashion.  What’s popular today…won’t be in near future, and often simply because the design and décor industry decided so. 

Take solid surfaces in the kitchen, for example. Solid surfaces in the kitchen serve three practical purposes: 1) Aesthetics. 2) Durability. 3) Ease of cleaning.  But if these surfaces are beautiful, long-lasting, and easy to maintain, why are luxury homeowners “upgrading” to concrete, quarts, marble, or even going back to tile?  In my opinion, it’s because they saw it in a magazine or on TV.  You know, on that show that’s sponsored by the big Home Improvement center! 

Photo courtesy of Pyrolave

I recently called on a property located on The Strand in Manhattan Beach, CA.  The listing agent humbly conceded that the home I was calling on was “dated” and needed upwards of a $500,000 in upgrades.  And I quote, “…the property still has granite counter tops. Can you believe that?” Evidently the owner was not “keeping up with the Kardashians”.  So, what’s hot this week?  Enameled Lava counter tops! Yep. You can run out right now and pay an estimated $400 per square foot for counter surfaces if that’s something that’s important to you.  Personally, I’d look into buying another investment property before I spent that much “upgrading” my counters.  Or would I?

Quality and Finish. One of the primary differences between a Luxury Home and a home that’s simply ‘big’ is the quality of materials and craftsmanship.  Take marble flooring for example.  Marble floors adorn the most opulent foyers, but how much does marble flooring actually cost?  You can get marble tile flooring for under $3 per sq. ft. if you’re not too picky.  Another $6 per foot to install and that 1,100 sq. ft. foyer and living room comes in at a cool $9,900.  However, for a finer cut of marble at $20 per sq. ft., and a more highly skill tradesman for $10 per sq. ft., setting the price tag for that Luxury foyer and living nearly $35,000.  Oh. I’m sorry.  You want real luxury?  Use marble slab at upwards of $100 per square foot and yes, you’ve got yourself a $110,000 entry to your living room.     

Is the home built Outside-In?  Another important feature of a Luxury Home is a floor-plan and

design that invites the beauty and views of the outside to become part of the inside.  This type of design, bringing the outside in, truly is a timeless attribute.  Whether you’re in Uptown Manhattan, Trousdale Estates, or Lake Tahoe’s Emerald Bay, soaking up the views from the comfort of your family room won’t just bring a smile to your face…but might bring an extra zero to the end of your listing price as well!

Tall Ceilings. At the time I wrote this post, I was sitting in an elegant formal living room. Albeit modest in terms of square footage, it was truly luxurious in terms of the sheer volume of space and the feeling it conveyed.  Its footprint is only 14’ by 20’. That’s 280 square feet; not huge by luxury home standards. However, when you add the ceiling height (22 feet) to the equation, the sense of grandeur is unavoidable.  It provides an anchor; a center for the entire home.  Yes, at 14’ x 20’ x 22 feet high, the living room is actually taller than it is long.  Compare this room with a room of the same square footage but an 8’ ceiling height. At 14’ x 20’, both rooms would be 260’ square.  Add volume to the equation and you go from 2080 cubic feet with an 8’ ceiling to 6,160 cubic feet. That’s 296% bigger.  It’s three times the size, and it feels like it.  So, unless you’re in the most highly sought after neighborhoods, or happen to own a mid-century architectural gem, a property has got to have one or two rooms with ceiling heights in the 12’-16’ range, or higher. There are very few homes with 8-foot ceilings throughout that truly warrant a “Luxury” price tag.

Storage. Convenient. Neat. Aesthetic.  Perhaps I’m biased on this one, being involved in many, many activities. But seriously, how can we live without lots of closets and ample additional storage that’s out of sight, but not out of mind.  If I had a buck for every three or four car garage I’ve seen that somehow doesn’t have room for A car…much less 3 or 4.  We’re American.  We keep stuff! Kitchen cabinets, a pantry, hall closets, linen closets, walk in closets, storage sheds out buildings, and on and on.  If designed intelligently, adequate and convenient storage might be the one feature that gets your contract signed.

I’ve not discussed a number of other items such as garages and car-ports, maids’ quarters, humidors, or bomb shelters, but I think you get the point. Certain traits and characteristics are timeless and will bring timeless value to any home, not just those of the rich and famous. So keep these in mind, whether the next home you buy cost $500,000 or $5 Million.