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6 Castles That Cost Less Than An Apartment In NYC
With Russian, Chinese, and Argentinian (with a record low in the blue dollar today) money washing ashore (in USD or Bitcoin) under the Status of Liberty, the 'prices' of upscale apartments in New York City have simply exploded. We thought some context for this apparent 'price' vs 'value' discrepancy was useful... presenting 6 castles that cost less than an apartment in NYC (and given the number of bedrooms, not to mention moats, dungeons, vineyards, ramparts and drawbridges - dramatically less in terms of per-capita spend).






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So, since there we have capital controls in place, I take it foreigners are buying these with cash?
Texas has no state income tax, and you can carry a concealed firearm to protect yourself.
This recently built "castle" is a 30 minute commute from Exxon's new headquarters.
Well, bubbles are transparent!
Compare kitchens and view of $1,500,000 in Texas with $1,650,000 in NY.
it's sad when your Castle comes with 40 acres instead of 40 servants. Ah, the Glory Days http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5-IoEcolp8
Best ZH piece since the mansion/crack house display from Vancouver.
LMAO
Umm are they renting? Thinking of moving, 18th babe on the way, income support from those + rent benifit might just stretch
It's only a joke if you buy it.
Why are these landmark Castles in France worth less than a condo in NYC? Something to think about.
They used to house gold there, until they traded the gold for kerosene to light and heat the castle. Once the money ran out and everyone moved on, the place became an empty dwelling that is now decayed away and has a value less than a heated apt in NYC.
AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all. -Kipling
3rd generation born and raised in the good ol' USA.
That being said, fuck NYC.
People claiming that taxes and upkeep are the reason for the divide have a point but it's negligible really.
There are maybe a couple of thousand castles in France, there are how many condo's in New York? 2 million?
Also there are two kinds of rich people, there are people with high incomes and then there are people with a lot of wealth. The two groups are indistinguishable in the mainstream media. But in reality they are two very different groups.
The wealthy can live wherever the hell they like. Whereas folk with high incomes must live near their work.
"Think, in this batter'd caravanserai
whose portals are alternate night and day,
how sultan after sultan with his pomp
abode his destin'd hour and went his way...
...When I was young I did eagerly frequent
Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument
about it and about, but evermore
went out the same door as in I went!"
-Omar Khayyam
+1000 Harbanger!
Thank you for reminding me.
Lots of open space...expensive to heat. Compartmentalize, then rent?
Get with 7 – 8 friends, buy a castle as a co-op.
Cheap vacations in France. Bring your friends! Everyone will have fantastic stories to tell, and you will be a big shot HE-RO back in Sheboygan!
Come on people. Note that all are located in F R A N C E ! Thanks to Msr Hollande the cost to carry makes NYC seem like a bargain. And let's talk about upkeep. I could reno one of these NYC joints alone. A decrepid castle?I'd take an army.
Walk to work is great but.....
I'll take the castle . . .
This article really brings into focus just how inflated prices for US real estate are now. NYC prices are insane.
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Insane? But that's where they print the money!
That's exactly what makes living there so insane.
I hate cooktops on islands! Obviously this kitchen wasn't built for entertaining. You can't have sushi models laying on the island while the chef is prepping the next appetizer. Re-do.
Kitchens in suburban houses are too big for chefs. They are mostly for show. You need to be able to reach everything within one step in a specific sequence. Fridge - prep counter - wash - counter - reach for pots and pans - range/oven - plating counter - serve. Try that in a big kitchen, you'll be calling for pizza delivery most times.
Kitchens in NYC are in the other extreme + these apartments are fire hazards.
Thank you!
I don't know how many times I've said that!
Everything in my kitchen is two steps. When I attempt to do any major cooking I end up feeling like I walked ten miles.
Plus, the family always thinks they can stand around or sneek past me. Someone is gonna get burned or cut eventually.
LOL! Ya gotta tell 'em - "stay outta my kitchen while I'm cookin'!"
Bingo. Restaurants serve hundreds in <half the cook space of most oversized household kitchens. I blame the well endowed Ciabatta DeLaurentis and HGTV.
Man, imagine how much stuff you could store in a 14 car garage.
A guy could run a pretty good ebay motors business with a 14 car garage. Maybe specialize in a particular model.
Kyle Bass could store all his nickels in a 14 car garage!
And some of you bitchez around here could just about squeeze your gun collection into that kind of garage. Me...I lost my firearms collection in that canoe accident that took out my gold and silver stash.
I like the prospects in Texas, but I am surprised at how high the property tax rates are. Housing in DFW is about 35 % less than where I live, but the property tax rates are about 140% higher. I can pay off the house, but not the property tax.
That's what you get for living in a non sales tax state.
and then the subsequent garage sales!
As the agent would say....room to grow.
that house in Texas in Awesome for the price.
the author is not taking into account how much taxes you have to pay for these castles...been there done that...you are talking 10% MINIMUM yearly.
who wants to pay 150k a year in taxes for a castle?
For My 300k house in Argentina i pay $100 YEARLY.
did you hear DOCHEN????
However in Texas they rape you with property Taxes of 2.5% or higher ...
Please stop pretending that texas is a gun rights state. It isn't. You can't open carry a pistol. Open carry should be the default, not prohibited.
And that example, as well as the 6, are more appropriately called palaces, not castles.
Note that the castles for sale were in France. The subtext here is what happens to property values when they fall within the jurisdiction of a politician who has made it his mission to redistribute wealth... so New York City real estate owners have nothing to fear, right?
There are probably some truly depressed suburbs or towns in the USA that you can pick up for less than the cost of a NYC apartment.
true and in spain you could buy a entire village with 120 houses voor 2 million. but what are you going to do with them when nobody lives there?
"taking otherwise beautiful land and turning into something God awful." yeah.."the euro"...that's the answer, right up there with all the other "paper tigers." now excuse me while i finally liberate Ireland...
I'm VERY interested Sudden Debt, but only if I get the tax and revenue stream from the village? Perhaps they could grow crops for me as well...and fight for me when I call my banners?
If those villages came with tennured serfs that would sound like a very good proposition. Feudalism may return to southern Europe and pre-positioning on a village or two may be a sound strategy for those who aspire to (lesser) nobility.
Why not a castle:
1. Taxes 2. Upkeep
ever try to heat one of those suckers. Open fireplace doesnt exactly cut it. You have to burn two acres a month just to keep it 62 degrees.
Why not just burn peasants? Isn't that how they used to heat these things?
Ahh serfs and peasants..the good old days, they paid way less tax than we do now
Sarc/off
Yes but when you have a moat you're safe from Zombie hordes...until there are too many zombies in your moat...and then you can call the zombie removal squad at your local zombie pest control.
Willya just leave the peasants alone? Geez, man-burn a bankster instead! THAT"S the smell of money...;)
We have a solution for that silver.....space heaters! LOL!
Wood chips.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBrbh6JxxuQ
Chips? Naw, we've all moved on to pelletized wood.
easy there.
I've seen castles sell for 1 euro but in the contract it states that you need to renovate it for millions and that's like a bottomless pit.
Plus you don't fully own them.
Yeah, I saw this and immediately thought Too Good To Be True....
Plus it could be haunted. LOL.
I would pay more for haunted.
yep, then you could open it up to tourists
Put those spooks to work! Just think, no benefits and they work for free!
Isn't that just like humanity to find a way to subject the spirit world to manual labor
yeah, the nakes playboy bunnies ghosts of the 70's...
their bush will scare the shit out anybody...
Does anybody anywhere actually OWN their land?
I do, I feel special
stop paying your land tax and see how long you own it
I actually own land that's not even mine...Argentina for ya..
do Chen?
It's not about relative value between one property over another. It's the fact that the world is so awash in dirty American dollars that the American money laundering business is inflating prices in the unregulated real estate industry. It is easier and less expensive to launder $100 million in one Manhattan co-op that in 20 chateaux on the Loire.
Yes, but the substantial cost of importing a top-class Dominatrix with whom to "interact" in the dungeon pushes the advantage back to the NY apartment.
Agreed - leather clad, busty, tatted dominatrices in stilettoed thigh-highs are a dime a dozen in Brooklyn.
Can I exchange my Bitcoin hoarde for a castle? No? Well, Bed-Stuy here I come, bitchez.
there are some pricey ass brownstones in much of bedstuy these days. you'd be surprised!. i wouldn't stop at franklin if you are look for cheap, go towards uttica.
Wow....... We wouldn't cross the street to live in the commie-zone that is NYC.
With a 75% top tax rate coming, chateaus will be a dime a dozen soon.
yes all castles wil be tourist destinations.
BTW we already have a REAL 75% tax rate here in USAA if you really add up all the hidden taxes we pay.
Yessir, you got fried shrimp, boiled shrimp, shrimp etoufee, steamed shrimp, shrimp fricasee...
Shrimp recipes are the secret key to the tax code.
Yeah but all those castles are in France for cri-yi.
Yeah, living in Gotham City is worth that kind of money, right? No thanks. I would take any of those castles over an apt. in New York, London, Shanghai etc in a heartbeat.
As NYC gets to remember why they threw David Dinkins out twenty years ago, your statement about NYC will be even more true.
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where's the joker when you need him?
....oh wait i forgot... Washington
Location location location... The rent is never too damn high for the privilege of scalping on Wall Street.
Do the castles come with peasants?
It would be less fun otherwise.
Once the supply lines break in earnest, they sure as hell will.
I remain long sharecropping, numerous physical assets, and a dependable tribe (peasant or otherwise)...
Serf's up! 'It's good to be the King.'
for USD 2m you can buy a "real" castle in South Florida.. also no state or city income tax.
A castle with a proper castle doctrine...
No thanks to either one. Castles have their own set of problems as money pits, and I don't want to "live" like fodder in the shithole called New York city. For a fraction of the cost I have a 2,500 square foot home with plenty of property to hunt at my leisure, and I can take a piss where ever I please.
...until the EPA spy drones spot you
Well you do have that to worry about.
Pissing in the woods, any direction you damn well please, is one the great, under rated pleasures on this sorry planet. Oddly enough, chicks never see it that way;)
Peeing while standing is the last remnant of manhood we all share.
Yeah, well, don't try that shit on a yacht in a heaving sea...unless you like selfie-showers, of course!
"EPA spy drones" Let's call them environmental monitors.
How about a 1K sq ft home with an extra 1500 sq ft of hunting/gardening space?
Does my math work out here?
I want the first one so I can start my own private jail.
One has to take into consideration that these 'castles' are located in what is the US equivlent of a Fly-Over state, hence their cheap prices.
Let me know if you take appliocations for an executioner...I only charge by the head.
I prefer not to pay for my head. I like getting it for free. Although being married I guess you could say I'm paying for it for the rest of my life.
Doc, If your wife is still going to town on you then you're ahead of the game. It's much worse to have to pay and then pay again.
With only 6 bedrooms (still trying to figure out how that's possible) you won't make very good margins...though I suppose you could charge admission for the public executions.
Yes, and also could fit a fair amount per room as standing room only, though those socialist bastards might have a problem with that.
Are you kidding? The French LOVE a good beheading! So do the English! You'll have to build a new wing and get festival permits.
When the really big crash comes, you'll be glad to live far from the hungry, entitlement-starved hordes from the inner-city.
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according to efficinet market theory ... price is always right.
This presumes an equally unfettered market. Never happened, and will likely not happen in our lifetimes.
Is arbitrage among States, all that remains?
Just ask yourselves why these residences in Austria and France went vacant?
I'm certain Monsieur Hollande will find ways to make you squeal with taxes you will be paying on top of that "buy of the Century"...
Inability of participants, to file the proper government paperwork to qualify for "green" energy tax credits.
China's FX Research Center: Gold Is The Strategy
http://www.ingoldwetrust.ch/chinas-fx-research-center-gold-strategy
Oh heck, let's buy the first one, rustle up the old Monty Python crew, speak English with a strong french accent and piss from the parapets at the first tax collector to come calling.
BTW - my tastes run far more toward the muff-baring 70s bunnies playing musical bedrooms than stilletto heeled dominatrix's in the dungeon, but to each their own. Reading this piece I simply could not get goofy images of Peter Sellers out of my mind. Clearly, today's playboy set has lost its way - chrome and glass, no matter how sparkly, simply does not compare to cold hard stone when it comes to impressing the ladies. Hef.
Why not have both?
A castle is not a castle unless it has a moat and a drawbridge.
The castles in the pictures therefore fail my buying criteria.
@Peter Pan
What about this one? too many bed-rooms ?
http://www.survoldefrance.fr/affichage2.php?img=29603&departement=Loir-e...
lol, man and his madness; the fire economy just shows it up.
Play on land of fiat $
forget castles, where iz the jobz?
http://www.oilcareers.com/content/categories/texas_oil.asp
But the Fed really likes New York and sends hundreds of billions of dollars a year to the priviliged of New York City. That is why real estate in NYC costs 20 times more than in flyover country.
New Yowk City prices are nothing. Signed, Zimbabwe
Example #4 states that it's a 5 bedroom 1,331 sq. ft. townhouse in the Bronx. How in the hell do you fit 5 bedrooms into 1,331 sq.ft.?
Was it originally built for a family of midgets?
At lease 2 of those alleged bedrooms are actually closets.
Honduran migrants. Besides, in NYC, a small walk-in closet qualifies as a bedroom.
if this wasnt in socialist france id think different about it. just goes to show that you dont get shit for your money in nyc though. nothing new either
if you dump a million in to modernize they can be made warm and cozy.....worked as a sou-chef years ago in one for a "family"....biggest collection of dysfunctional people I have ever met.....until I joined the military.
Too bad all the castles are in socialist hellholes.
Oops, so are the apartments.
Carry on.
Bars on the windows in Bronx. Unheard of. Zombies won't steal stuff.
The fruit of QE doesn't fall far from the tree.
All property close to financial centres is screaming up in value because the banksters are the only beneficiaries of the QE. Like suckling pigs they need to be close to the sow for regular feed. The Fed Mummy pig has sore nipples but wants to fatten her piglets.
Then how do you explain Wash DC area? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/local/highest-income-counties/
Perhaps the financial centers are merely the decoys for the real beneficiaries of QE - the bureaucrats.
It should be noted that the sticker price of the castles far understate their cost. They are located in places with VERY HIGH property taxes (yes, even compared to New York) Maintenance is a constant, and massive expense. Most of these structures are historically significant, so you'll probably need approval from a historical commission (by hiring a team of historians and architects) before you do anything more than change a light bulb. And the landscaping... just plan on bringing in the entire population of some town in Mexico.
lol France. I guess that millionaire tax didn't cause the capital flight everyone was talking about.
Do the castles come with rats like the NY apartments? You've got to consider food costs too.
How do you attend a Rangers game if you live in god damn France? USA!USA!
A nice dream for the average ...
Fuck NY
But in NY you might get a chance to spot the Squid.
Concrete Shithole
The smart money is buying South of the equator.
You'd think them rich frogs would be snappin' up them joints with 45 bathrooms.
Oh, wait--there are no rich frogs.
I'm looking at some properties in Detroit... If you buy at auction you might be pleasantly surprised. If you can handle the neighborhood...
https://pathofmusashi.wordpress.com/2014/01/07/winter-shoes/
And pay 8000 per year in property taxes. Thats the rubb
Ouch. let me look into that. I looked at the assessment records for some couple random homes. That sounds pretty steep
Plus whatever the unpaid back taxes amount to.
Like this castle ...
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_ngWnJ8oGe_0/TTMla23ngPI/AAAAAAAAAU4/wDQ0O1bbWj...
But I really prefer this one, property of Duc de Blacas, which inspired Walt Disney Cinderella Castle :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=800pApDNEKI&list=PL415C460A77AC6A50&index=2
I remember in the 90s when williamsburg was a ghetto. Nobody in there right mind would go there for any thing. Now the fools line up to spend millions in billyburg, and greenpoint with its massive toxic waste spill that was never cleaned up, ie netown creek. And Bed Stuy still to this day is a black ghetto and the prices are in the millions..... A fool and his money shall soon part
Costs about $5k/day to operate one of those castles.
ATM - Then how do you explain Wash DC area? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/local/highest-income-counties/
Fair point I forgot politicians but then again banksters/politicians, same agenda.......all hanging off the Fed nipples.
Sell the last one. Buy the second one, move it stone by stone to the Crown Hights lot and keep the change! I'll bet someone on Wall Street is thinking about using that bonus to float it too!
On the 19th, I plan on getting some NY-style pizza (in Sioux Falls, SD!). Anything else from NY? Meh.
not one moat
amongst the lot
how can you have a castle
with out a moat
for the draw bridge...
This might be relevant to this article:
http://www.reddit.com/r/funny/comments/1uikoq/6_castles_that_cost_less_than_an_apartment_in_nyc/ceimqnw
would not it be cheaper to live in a hotel all your life ?