Lawyerly Lairs: Aaron Charney's De-Luxe Apartment in the Sky-y-y

In Lawyerly Lairs, a recurring ATL feature, we check out the luxurious homes of prominent figures within the legal profession. If you share our addiction to real estate porn, this is a column you’re sure to enjoy.
In recent editions of Lawyerly Lairs, we’ve visited a $2.8 million mansion in Cambridge, MA, home to celebrity law professors Noah Feldman and Jeannie Suk (“Feldsuk”); a $20 million Park Avenue pad, recently sold by Cravath partner John Beerbower; and a $29 million townhouse, owned by Columbia Law professor Hans Smit (and resided in by his son, Simpson Thacher partner Robert Smit).
Today we look at a residence which, while not as lavish as these spreads, should still be of great interest to ATL readers. It’s the Hell’s Kitchen apartment of celebrity litigant Aaron Charney. It’s in a high-rise, luxury condominum building called the Orion (pictured at right).
Join us after the jump, won’t you?


All of this information was assembled using public records and the internet. We went to no extraordinary steps to compile it. In fact, we didn’t even get up from our chair to write this report.
We have omitted mention of Aaron Charney’s street address (even though it appears on his publicly-filed complaint). So this is all fair game.
Okay. Think back to late 2006. Was M&A associate Aaron Charney expecting a truckload of cash from Sullivan & Cromwell, in settlement of his contemplated lawsuit against the firm, alleging anti-gay discrimination and retaliation?
City records show that in late November, Charney closed on an $820,000 condominium in the fancy new Orion building, on the west side of Manhattan. The deed was dated November 27, 2006, and was filed with New York City on December 5, 2006.
Charney financed this purchase with a $656,000 mortgage — 80 percent financing. Perfectly respectable; not overly leveraged. This means he put down about $164,000 for the purchase.
What do we know about Charney’s unit (hehe)? Not as much as we might like. According to one commenter, who described Charney as “a good kisser,” ABC’s apartment is decorated with “pictures of his mom and dad (ALL over).” How sweet!
We do know a fair amount about the building as a whole. It’s a 61-story, condominum tower, on the corner of 42nd Street and Ninth Avenue in Manhattan (Times Square / Hell’s Kitchen). We’re told that it’s one of the five tallest residential buildings in New York City.
The New York Times recently ran a feature on living in the Times Square neighborhood, and it singled out the Orion for special mention:

The Orion Condominium has four one-bedroom apartments available, at prices of $715,000 to $735,000. The building has a gym, three exterior decks, pool and hot tub, and offers a free Starbucks breakfast to residents every day, said Jason Karadus, a vice president for the Corcoran Group.

Here’s a property description from an advertisement for another apartment in the development:

A full-service luxury concierge condo run by prestigious Abigail Michael Concierge. Building has fully-equipped gym with the highest technology by La Palestra, free breakfast included in common charges, cold storage for deliveries, parking garage, full-time super and ’round the clock staff. Midtown location is the artery to all major subway and bus line in a neighborhood poised to be a major destination for luxury retail and restaurants.

A free Starbucks breakfast — plus a state-of-the-art gym, to work off all the calories in that maple oat nut scone? Awesome. We know Aaron has enough free time to take advantage of these amenities.
Although the city records don’t state the square footage of Charney’s apartment, we can hazard a guess at the size of his unit. As you can see from the ever-helpful Trulia, or from this list of apartments currently for sale, apartments in the Orion generally go for about $1300 a square foot. So if we assume a price of $1300 a square, Charney’s apartment is probably about 630 square feet in size.
To those of you who have never lived in Manhattan, that may sound like a shoebox. But to those of us who have, 630 square feet is positively palatial!
Congratulations on the purchase of your new home, Aaron! If you ever want to have us over for coffee and leftover Starbucks pastries — we LOVE their cinnamon scones — you know how to reach us.
Updates (4:50 PM):
1. It’s worth noting that Aaron closed on his apartment in November 2006. Presumably he went into contract several weeks earlier. We don’t know whether prices in the building would have been higher or lower in fall 2006 than they are today.
2. We don’t know whether she ultimately purchased a unit in the building. But aging supermodel Rachel Hunter, the former Mrs. Rod Stewart, did take a tour of the premises.
Further Updates (5:10 PM):
1. As one of you notes, Charney may have put a contract down in the apartment back in 2005, before the building was finished — and, of course, before the alleged harassment began (in spring 2006). So perhaps he bought the apartment in anticipation of a long and successful career as a corporate lawyer at Sullivan & Cromwell.
ACRIS Online City Register [NYC.gov]
Slogging to sparkle on far West 42nd Street [The Real Deal]
The Orion [Trulia.com]
2-bedroom, 2-bath condo in the Orion [Corcoran]
Apartments for Sale in the Orion [natefind.com]
Those Neon Lights? Just as Bright as They Say [New York Times]
Rachel Hunter, Several Stories Up and Other Stories [Fox News]

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