Would you live at the mall in Natick?
I know I wouldn’t.
The subject, of course, comes to mind with the Globe’s story how the bankrupt owner of the Natick Collection will start auctioning off condos at the deluxe and mostly empty Nouvelle.
Back during the heady days of the boom, General Growth rolled out plans for downtown style condo high-rise as part of its plans to transform the tired Natick Mall into the upscale Natick Collection.
The revamped mall, packed with all sorts of glitzy stores, opened up just as the economy began to slow and the luxury tag began to quickly lose its luster.
The condos have not fared so well either, with just 37 of 215 units sold.
OK, maybe it’s a guy thing, but I never really got this idea. My wife and I live in an old and slowly improving fixer-upper near Natick center and I do my best to avoid frequent trips to the traffic clogged, retail-crazed strip on Route 9.
I generally hate malls of all shapes and sizes – even the air makes me feel a little sick/trapped.
My wife, by contrast, loves malls. In fact, when we went to check out the revamped Natick Collection, I asked her what she thought of the Nouvelle and the idea of living at the mall.
I was floored by her response. Basically, she’s do it in a minute.
Anyway, if suburban mall shopping is your thing, then the Nouvelle is your project, for it sits right in the middle of all that Route 9 retail madness.
And after spending years talking about Back Bay like prices, with top units supposedly set to fetch more than a $1 million, the developers are singing a different song now.
Forty-two units will hit the auction block on Oct. 4. The minimum bids range from $160,000 to $315,000.
Good luck, but you won’t find me there. I’ll stick with my Natick fixer-upper.
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IMO, Natick Collection/Nouvelle fails largely because it's really too high end for us. We buy quality, we buy value but we very seldom buy "prestige" and "luxury". People shops for a Burberry scarf since the brand represents status and wealth. Here, we don't buy a LV bag simply because of the monogram. (Instead we use car and size of the house as symbol of wealth)
If people do not see prestige in Natick Collection, there is absolutely no reason to live there. But if people simply love Bottega Veneta/Prada, they will identify Natick Collection (and thus the proximity to it) as a big big plus. In places like Tokyo or London, where people do have huge brand loyalty to the labels in Natick Collection, Natick Collection/Nouvelle would be big success. In fact, there are quite a few high end malls just like Natick Collection in Hong Kong (with successful hotel/condos attached) and London.
The problem is it's a terrible (and quitely frankly, stupid) idea to put it in a New England suburb.
We are a retired couple, and my husband and I also would move into the Nouvelle in a minute if we could afford. I like the idea of living in the mall. I could walk around the mall in the morning as a morning exercise, I could still walk around the mall even in the snow storm or hurricane. Only thing that would stop us to buy a unit at Nouvelle is the condo fee and the tax. We need at least two bedroom unit, one for us and one for a guest like our children who would visit us occasionally.
61 cents per SQ is very high for people like us who live with the fixed income. The smallest two bedroom is 1060 sq. The condo fee will be around $650. You also have to add tax, utility, phone and internet, heating and cooling...On top of these expenses, we may end up paying more assessment as GGP leaves.
I think rich retired couple would live in downtown Boston where there are more choices of restaurants and other cultural events. Also there are a lot of excellent hospitals in Boston which are very important to retired couples.
Young professional couples or young professional singles would never move into this Nouvells, most family with children would not move into Nouvelle...
Its perfect for someone like us who cannot afford a downtown condo, yet the downtown like condo fee and other unavoidable expenses would be stopping us bidding into this auction.
Yet another terrible CRE idea aimed at the soon-to-be-extinct "mass affluent" buyer... Question: What happens in 10 years when that mall is anchored by TJX and Marshalls and that nice little french style bistro (which is surprisingly good by the way) turns into an Appleby's? Answer: Hell on earth.
I feel very bad for the 37 suckers who bought those condos.
I guess I married I right girl (I know it actually) since my wife and I both hate the mall. We try to avoid the Natick Collection at all costs.
It's not for me. I'm not fond of malls either. OTOH, convenient retail is a nice amenity. I'd much prefer a condo in Back Bay (given the choice between the two) over a mall in Natick.
What I found interesting is that the Globe article didn't specify whether there was a reserve or not. If there is a reserve, then the auction is just advertising, and the Globe went along with it.
I have the sneaking suspicion that's exactly what happened
"Yet another terrible CRE idea aimed at the soon-to-be-extinct "mass affluent" buyer... Question: What happens in 10 years when that mall is anchored by TJX and Marshalls and that nice little french style bistro (which is surprisingly good by the way) turns into an Appleby's? Answer: Hell on earth."
Actually Lance, it will probably anchored by a Dollar Store and a McDonalds.
charles, spot on. I commented on the original article that all of the condos have reserves, yet the article breathlessly reprinted puffery from the promoter about how "everything must go," as if the auction were absolute. Nor was there even a cursory digging into the frequent reports that at previous unrelated auctions at other properties buyers say they were not, in fact, able to purchase the condos they bid on.
All this discussion about whether people personally like malls or if they're too "deep" to buy Prada misses the point. Malls are a dying CRE breed. No new ones are being built. Many are failing. Buying a condo at the mall ties your personal fortune to a completely unrelated investment that is fading in value. Perhaps the Natick mall will survive--I like it, actually, for a mall--but why take the huge risk?
Another point that folks forgot to mention about living in a condo connected to a mall is that from mid November to the end of December you are dealing with chaos day in and day out. How would you like to go home to that after a long day of work?
the Mall was crowded and doing just fine before it was renamed to the Collection. if these high end shops fail, it's still a good mall w/o those shops. the only other malls around here are solomon pond in hudson/marlborough (it's small and has no good shops) and the atrium in newton. natick mall is in a great location, so i dont know what all the complaining is about. btw, i live 1 mile from the mall and i've still had to drive around the parking lot for 5 minutes every weekend for the past year (since the "recession" started) just to find a parking spot. i think the regular stores like macy's are doing just fine.
on a more positive note, Corus finally went toes up last night with a hit to the the FDIC of $1.7B. They got into trouble from lending to "luxury" condo projects in the sun belt. How many more Corus banks do we have have out there? Probably quite a few. Think of all the silly "luxury" crap around here; someone will take a bullet on those projects. We are not even half way through this mess...
So what are the implications for the still high prices for Natick and the outer suburbs? The pricing in many of the towns has been very sticky. You see houses come on the market at 2005 prices and just sit for awhile.
Just as the asking prices for these condos seemed crazy high, you have to wonder at the outer suburbs nearby 495. When you get out that far, you really are not in an ideal commuting range to Boston as if you were in Brookline or Newton or Winchester, so the pricing is hard to justify.
Yes, the pricing for the outer suburbs for houses is still relatively high. I've been looking at houses (not condos) for the last 3 mounths in the Framingham, Marlborough, Northborough, Southborough areas and there is still a disconnect between sellers and the buyer's market we are in. Prices are dropping, but only after sitting on the market for a while.
My commute is to Framingham, so it makes sense for me to find something beyond 495. If I was commuting to Boston, Framingham would be as far out as I would go, about 35 min to Boston taking I-90.
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