Realtor: Downtown Detroit condo sells for record $1.8M

Charles E. Ramirez | The Detroit News

A downtown Detroit condominium has sold for a record $1.8 million, an area realtor said Monday.

Bingham Farms-based Coldwell Banker Weir Manuel said real estate agent Kyle Swink sold the 2,500-square-feet, 3-bedroom condo recently, the company said in a statement.

Swink said the company is not disclosing the name of the buyer.

The real estate agent said he thinks the condo's sale is more evidence the city has turned around.

"If someone would have said you were going to reach that number three or four years ago, I think a lot of people would have told you that you were crazy," Swink said. "But this just shows you where we're going."

Located in the Westin Book Cadillac, 1114 Washington Blvd. at Michigan Avenue, the condo features two-and-a-half baths, 35-foot vaulted ceilings, Brazilian marble and views of the Detroit River, the Ambassador Bridge and a good portion of the downtown area.

Coldwell Banker said the condo is the highest priced condo sale in the city’s history.

The Detroit News verified the claim with Realcomp II Ltd., the state’s largest multiple listing service. Based in Farmington Hills, the company provides real estate information to more than 13,500 brokers, agents, and appraisers.

Swink said the condo was put on the market in January with a listing of about $2.5 million.

The deal for the sale closed late last week, he said.

The same condominium was first bought in 2010 for $725,000, according to city records. The most recent sale hasn’t been included in at least some public records.

The penthouse was always intended to be a $1 million-plus property but it first went on sale – along with the other 62 Book Cadillac condos – amid the worst real estate crash in decades. That forced the developer to slash the original prices of the penthouses and other condos by as much as 35 percent in order to sell them.

The condominiums were part of the two-year $200 million transformation of the historic Book Cadillac that converted the building into a Westin hotel and condominiums. The building reopened in late 2008 after being closed since 1984.

The tops the previous record set last year, when a condo in the Book Cadillac sold for $1.2 million, but it was unfinished, Swink said. Unfinished means the buyer had to complete the surfaces of the walls, floors or ceilings after the sale.

"It's very exciting," he said. "It's a big deal when you start reaching these kind of numbers in the city. This is kind of the new benchmark."

Coldwell Banker Weir Manuel is a real estate brokerage firm with 18 offices and more than 600 sales associates.

cramirez@detroitnews.com

Louis Aguilar contributed.