Million Dollar Listing New York: An Ugly Couch, A Bloody Saw, A Sperm Oven

Time for am Million Dollar Listing New York Recap!  Let’s See how Luis recovers from his devastating loss of listing last week, and if Fredrik can keep his selling streak going on the huge condo deal!

Fredrik is busting a nut over a potential listing. It is a stunning apartment but he seems to think it is the best thing in the universe. He wants to make a listing for the apartment and a listing for the furnishings separately. He is concerned about squabbling over furniture items. I suppose that makes sense. Fredrik sets what sounds like as a high price at 10.5 Million. The seller wants 11 million PLUS the separate furniture contract. Frankly, I think the buyer for this house will have to be a straight male or a gay male who is just in love with the interior design. As a woman, I’d want to change a ton of things already, and if I had 11 million to drop on an apartment (which will also have common charges) I’d want to do my own decorating. But we shall see.

Fredrik is photographing the apartment with a professional photog but also taking selfies for social media. I should probably be following him. I am starting to fall in love.  I don’t like his giant tattoo though. What is that supposed to be? Fredrik is chatting with his hubby about adoption. He’s a little scared. He doesn’t know if he is ready to do it immediately. Fredrik wants a daughter, blue eyes, curly brown hair and he already has a name for her, Mila.  I am wondering whose sperm will be used. I believe that some gay couples mix the sperm so they won’t know for sure who the biological father is. Um, sorry, I tend to overanalyze.

Wow, Fredrik has sold everything except the penthouse in his $180 million dollar building. Impressive if true. Now the builder wants to look at the apartment he just listed for $11million that he saw on Fredrik’s social media. Even Fredrik is surprised. I am suspicious. He already lives in a fab place. I think he want to get rid of the competition for his penthouse. We shall see. Zack, his developer seems to be scoping for ideas. Apparently this place is the end all be all. He wants to put in a full ask, but fully furnished. Fredrik tries to explain about the two contract thing. Bear in mind, this is his NUMBER ONE client but in this situation he is the agent for the seller. Man, this is a hard place to be.

Fredrik goes to present the offer to Zeke, who he repeatedly calls “Zee Key.” He says no. He can have it without the furniture. So they are as Fredrik feared going to fight over a sofa.

Luis is working like fiend trying to generate listings the old-fashioned way, cold calling. God I hated doing that. Basically, you go to all the homes that are for sale by the owners and try to convince them that you should list it for them instead. The fact that the owner Sam, agreed to meet with Luis at the apartment is a promising start. Sam is married. To a woman. This surprises me. There is no feminine touch. The apartment is lovely but the interior design is very dated. It’s immaculate with every closet pristine (how the hell do people do that?) but the furnishing are a distraction. I assume Luis will suggest staging. Maybe he will but first he talks about bringing in pre-qualified buyers rather than any Tom, Dick or Mary that responds to his ad in the NYT.  Ah, here it comes, the staging request. Luis says he will stage it on his dime. The problem is you have to be very careful with sellers when you essentially need to tell them that their furniture is ugly. Luis also fast talks and says things like “this is another reason you should let someone who knows what they are doing” sell the apartment. That said, the guy agrees to give Luis the listing.

Luis begins staging the house. Sam freaks out because they literally pack up the chair from under his butt. When the staging is done, It’s not really that much better. He really could have gotten rid of only the couch and a few other major pieces that needed to go and just done some bedding changes and the whole art, throw rugs, paint a wall thing. Instead he removed every item from their home and turned his office back into a bedroom. So now, the man who works from home has no place to work. He’s not pleased. He’s also worried about the cleanliness of the staging furniture. Because anyone with closets like this man has OCD bad.  Or good. I would love to date someone with OCD. Please come spend a week in my house.

Luis has lots of appointments, but Sam works from home so he is always there. It’s hard to get him out of the way to show the place. I don’t think it is necessary for Sam to have to remove the desktop computer from the bedroom for each showing. Having a computer set up is perfectly normal.

Luis gets a full price offer, all cash, 45 day close! YES! Less than six days listed. Sam is an idiot. An idiot with OCD. He wants to stay in NYC for more than 45 days so he want to wait for another offer. WTF? Why does shit like this always happen to Luis? Luis drives to where Sam is at a park. Sam is freaking out and having second thoughts. He is at a park where he used to go with his wife. Oh God, is she dead? He’s getting all emotional about leaving NYC. After talking to Luis, he agrees to take the deal.

Ryan has a listing call as well in Murray Hill, a section of midtown Manhattan.  The owner is a female, who seems a bit odd. The townhouse is a row house with five floors sort of like the one Sonja Morgan recently had to vacate.  I think it said it was 4000 square feet over FIVE tiny floors. This means spending a lot of time on the stairs or in a claustrophobic elevator made a million years ago. What happens if you live alone and get stuck in the elevator? Do you just die in there?  I’m serious. And phobic about elevators. It’s VERY old. The furnishing are all ancient. The house is very cold. She sends Ryan to the basement alone. This means that there is only four floors of living space but the basement eats up a fifth of the square footage. And it is filled with bones and baby doll heads. Ryan asks about all the crosses and jokes about ghosts and the woman says her maid feels their presence sometimes and it scares her. Ryan is afraid. Ryan wants to run away but it is a six figure commission. Ryan lists it for $3.995 million.

Ryan holds an open house for his ghost-infested listing. Then my worst fear happens. He is stuck in the elevator during the pre open house set up! And his minion is like outside somewhere. Apparently all that he can do is put a button that lights a light up outside the elevator or something. NO! There needs to be a button that directly calls a fire truck full of hot as hell half-dressed fire men to make getting in that death box a possibility.  Ryan starts to scream for his assistant, but she is two floors down in the kitchen. Suddenly, it just works and he escapes.

Lots of weird shit happens. Water faucets run, weird noises, and then someone asks to see the basement. Did he not remove all the doll heads and saws and sawed off doll parts? Apparently he forgot. Ryan’s scenes this season all seem to be totally fake. I’m sort of okay with that because they are funny.  After the open house, Ryan gets no offers. He says he does not believe in ghosts, yet he is scared to death of the house. He is trying to find someone to cleanse the house from evil spirits.  Ryan has a variety of fucknuts come in to check out the house. There is bell ringing from one, sage burning from another, some blessings and some spraying of holy water or some such shit.

Next week: Ryan has a bidding war on a property. Luis faces an unexpected challenge and Fredrik is stuck in a terrible situation when his very best client who he is not representing sits down with his seller who he is representing to argue over furnishings.