Rent Today, Gone Tomorrow

With the high-end market expanding, college kids have new company in the rental game: very wealthy grownups.

By Jason Feifer

: HIGH LIFE: Devonshire amenities include city views, sleek quarters, and a pool. Photos by Diana Levine.

The New Shortage
It’s not housing; it’s housing reports.

For all the residential developments going up here, there’s an odd dearth of independent market research to track it. The reason is a sad one: The state’s best coverage came from Tom Meagher, whose tiny firm, Northeast Apartment Advisors, operated out of his Acton home; when he died of cancer in May, reports came to a halt, and developers and journalists quickly noticed. His wife, Nancy, now checks his voicemail, hoping to sell the company and keep his work alive. —J.F.

Software consultant Brian Lambert owned a McMansion in Windham, New Hampshire, but felt antsy and tied down. So two years ago he sold it and relocated to Boston, where, rather than buy again, he’s renting a lush one-bedroom at Archstone Boston Common for $3,600 a month—a move that these days is becoming an increasingly popular option for housing-seekers like him.

With the city continuing to gain large, luxe apartment buildings—at least one is expected to have opened every year from 2005 to 2009—a new archetype of renter is emerging: rich folks who may not stick around long, and so prefer paying for commitment-free comfort. Some are coming for Boston’s growing financial and biotech industries, and now have a viable alternative to condos. Others simply distrust the uncertain local market.

As high-end apartments become more common, so do extreme rents. Vesta, a West End building that opened in November, immediately rented its top digs for $9,900 a month. In the Financial District, Devonshire starts at $2,200, and its best goes for $15,000. (Penthouses are such status symbols that they never sit empty for long. “We’d make the whole building penthouses if we could,” says Ruben Companies senior VP Craig Deitelzweig, who oversees Devonshire.)

ome big-spending tenants rarely even come to town. Christopher Reilly, a VP at Equity Residential, says one of his clients paid $14,000 a month but split his time among five other, international homes. Another maintained a unit near Mass General on the off chance a family member would get sick. Not that Reilly minds—they all pay their rents on time.

Department Of Perks
To keep pace with hotels, condos add coddling.

The luxury downtown condo building 45 Province won’t open until 2009, but already touts a lavish future feature: a residents-only Exhale spa, complete with yoga instructors. It’s one of many services here “you’d see in a hotel, without all the chaos of a hotel,” says developer David Epstein. That’s a message local condo builders are pushing hard, as they compete with a growing stock of condo-hotels such as the InterContinental and the Mandarin Oriental.

With hoteliers using amenities to lure full-time residents—the Mandarin, when it opens on Boylston Street in July, will boast a 16,000-plus-square-foot spa—stand-alone condos almost have to beef up their own offerings. South Boston’s seven-month-old Macallen has a 20,000-square-foot rooftop park, Brookline’s Longwood Towers has a sweet game room, and the forthcoming FP3 in Fort Point Channel will have a Barbara Lynch restaurant complex. Concierge service and private movie theaters, meanwhile, have become standard. Next up, perhaps: a mint on every pillow. —Noah Schaffer

Originally published in Boston magazine, January 2008