Bible tracts no more—the penthouse at the old Watchtower warehouse is asking $5.5 million.

The Watchtower Society may have all but divested itself of its waterfront Brooklyn holdings, but those seeking their own personal watch tower in the sky need not convert to get it—One Brooklyn Bridge Park, at 360 Furman Street in Brooklyn Heights, has re-listed its 14th-floor penthouse, and it can be all yours for just $5.5 million.

The unit has been on the market on and off since 2007, said broker Penelope Stipanovich at MNS, who has the listing, and the price was just cut from $7.25 million.

Elizabeth Stribling set a condo record for the borough when she picked up two penthouses in the building for $6.6 million right before the crash—a decision the real estate maven may now regret given that her buy remains the building's high water market. (Although the purchase went to fund something equally important—buyer confidence during a critical time). And the building is doing much better than the days when two-thirds of its 449 units sat unsold: according to Ms. Stipanovich, 90 percent of the units are now sold, with prices steadily increasing, "almost back to the original offering prices."

Though the penthouse has been in search of a buyer for over half a decade, it has not sat vacant. It was taken off the market at one point in order to be rented out for TV, said Ms. Stipanovich, when it played host to a number of reality competitions, including Bravo's Top Chef All-Stars and HGTV's Design Star.

Those seeking biblical literature may not find it at One Brooklyn Bridge Park, but no worries—the Watchtower can still be found at subway stations throughout the city.

In fact, The Observer picked up a tract just this morning asking, in Haitian Creole, "Ki sa noun ka aprann nan egzanp Moyiz?"—what can we learn from Moses' example? Surely they're talking about Robert Moses? If so, we've already absorbed the lesson: One Brooklyn Bridge Park would likely sell a bit better were it not cut off from prime Brooklyn Heights territory by his Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.

Brooklyn: Nice place, but the food is terrible, we hear...

It's good to change with the times, move to new neighborhoods (boroughs even!), expand one's client-base. But, you know, nothing too wild, like buying groceries in Brooklyn.

In a Real Deal profile, Brooklynite Elizabeth Stribling talks about how she and her brokerage firm have changed, expanding their focus beyond the most elite and elitist precincts of Manhattan, but reveals that she still does her grocery shopping on the Upper East Side.

The founder of the eponymous real estate brokerage famous for selling posh Upper East Side co-ops moved into One Brooklyn Bridge Park back in 2009 (when the building she was repping was struggling, a move seen by many as an attempt to put her money where her mouth was). Ms. Stribling promptly embraced most aspects of  borough life, checking out Brooklyn blogs to find the most interesting restaurants and activities in her new neighborhood.

"She has a way of finding all the hipster spots,” Ms. Stribling's daughter Elizabeth Ann Kivlan told The Real Deal.

But despite the fact that the borough has a Fairway, a Trader Joe's and numerous artisinal grocers nearby, Ms. Stribling admits to driving back to the Upper East Side to buy her bread and milk.

“I still shop on the Upper East Side,” Ms. Stribling confessed to The Real Deal. “I put my groceries in the trunk of the car, and then drive right back.”

Maybe Ms. Stribling will finally change her mind when Whole Foods comes to Gowanus?

kvelsey@observer.com

Shadowy!

Shadow inventory. It was supposed to be the boogeyman of the real estate bust, thousands upon thousands of unsold properties scattered across the city. Bought or built for more than they were worth, people would hang onto these homes until the market improved, giving a better appearance to the housing supply than actually existed. It's like the difference between the standard and broad rates of unemployment.

No matter. To real estate doyenne and new Brooklynite Elizabeth Stribling, there is no shadow inventory, or so she tells The Times in one of its patented 30-Minute Interviews.

I never quite understood this idea of a shadow inventory — supposedly the apartments that hadn’t been leased in developments. I thought, well, when the market turned down, they will be rented and they’ll come on slowly — which is exactly what’s happening now. The demand for new product and the latest is really out there.

Hurray! Disaster averted. Not quite. The Observer checked in with shadow spook Jonathan Miller and he agreed that indeed shadow inventory was down from what he presumed was about 6,000 units at the peak to about 3,000 units of unsold wanting units today. But he still insists this is a tough trend that could take a few more years to fix.

"This should not signal to people that it is time to go out and start building again," Mr. Miller said. "It's like losing 100 pounds and still being 50 pounds overweight, and then saying it's time to start eating again."

Mr. Miller said we should actually thank the banks for helping out on this count. Because they continued to deny just how much the value of their assets had declined, because it threatened the financial firms own survival. As a result, many properties that would have been foreclosed on and sold off were held onto, converted into rentals and hotels or sold off. There is still plenty out there to worry about, though.

"This is a problem that has been managed by attrition, and we've ended up in a better place than we were, but we're still not out of the woods yet," Mr. Miller said.

mchaban [at] observer.com | @MC_NYC

I got a sneak peak at the Ballroom last month, when it was still undergoing the renovations. Elizabeth Stribling, whose firm markets The Plaza condos, told me that the ceiling, in particular, would be restored. Apparently, that hadn't been done since Conrad Hilton owned the place in the middle of the last century.

A lot of famous folks have passed through--and out in-- the Ballroom, of course, including attendees of Truman Capote's 1966 "Black and White Ball" and Mick Jagger's 1993 50th birthday party.

Location: Can you describe the marketing of the Plaza? What were some of the biggest assets used to market it? I imagine it wasn’t difficult.

Marketing, quite frankly, is always difficult. … In the case of the Plaza Hotel, the Plaza itself was its own iconic image. But what we had to do was tell the public that they were not buying the old Plaza, the former Plaza, the faded splendor of a grande dame.

They were going to be buying into a new place, a rejuvenated Plaza that would maintain the absolute allure of this legend—and, yet, would be a fresh, up-to-date entity with a lot of vitality, with a buzz. … And that was not the case for the last 10 years; that was not the case for the last 20.

What happened?

It had become, quite frankly, dowdy. It had become run-down. And it had become faded.

Stribling & Associates has affiliations in Europe and you live part-time in France.

Correct! I’m lucky enough to have a home in the south of France and an apartment in Paris.

Given the strength of the British pound and the euro and even the Canadian dollar at this point, how reliant is the luxury market in New York on foreign buyers?

The top of the luxury market does not seem to be relying on the foreign buyers at all. When I say ‘at all,’ most of our luxury, luxury top-end real estate is in the co-op sector; and the foreigners are not really buying the beautiful Park Avenue, Fifth Avenue co-ops. That said, there certainly are a lot of foreigners who are investing in condominiums, whether for investment purposes or for their own dwellings. I would say that probably one-third of the condominium sales within the past 18 months has been made by foreign nationals.

Why aren’t foreigners buying co-ops?

Well, first of all, in many instances, you have to show that you’re not using this as a pied-à-terre, that you have enough assets in the United States. Most foreigners do not want to give their financial statements in full; it’s a requirement of co-op boards.

So, the credit crisis and all the problems in the mortgage markets—that’s not affecting the luxury market that much?

We have actually seen continuing bidding wars. We seem insulated from a lot of the credit crunch across the United States; and I think, quite frankly, that the very rigors to gain access into a co-op building and the rigorous requirements of our [condo] developers here—where you’ve got to put down 10 percent and another 10 percent after a certain period of time and, in some instances, a full 25 percent—you cannot, of course, sign those contracts until they’ve closed.

The Plaza, speaking of foreign buyers, has a lot of Russian and Russian-American buyers …

So the media tells me! But not according to my sales contracts.

How many are there—Russian buyers, specifically?

I think we have several Russian families in the building but no more than that.

How many is several?

I think ‘several’ usually refers to three.

And what are some other blocs, so to speak, of foreign buyers?

Well, first of all, I think you’d be interested to know, 63 percent of our purchasers are United States citizens; and that leaves just 37 percent that have been purchased by foreigners. The majority of our United States buyers have come from New York City, and California is the second. So I’m pleased to say that New Yorkers have given an outstanding vote of confidence to the Plaza.

Have people started moving in?

We have, to my knowledge, several families who are living here; very few. We have already closed 50 percent of our deals and many of the decorators are at work.

As The Observer and other media have reported, there’s been at least two purchases in the Plaza by single buyers of at least $50 million, which would make them the most expensive apartment buys in New York City history. I understand that Stribling is known for its discretion, especially on marketing high-end developments like this, but The New York Times reported that one of those buyers is the developer Harry Macklowe. Is that true?

Well, you’ve very rightly said that Stribling is known for its discretion. I’ve made a career of it, and I like to protect all my buyers.

But is it not Harry Macklowe?

As I’ve just said to you, I’m really not going to comment on who our buyers are.

Have there been any other $50 million ones?

We’ve had two sales in excess of $50 million. We’ve had three individual buyers buy apartments for between $40 and $50 million; one between $30 and $40 million; and four between $20 and $30 million.

What’s been the least expensive buy so far?

When we began our sales, we sold a big brush of apartments, one-bedrooms for $1.5, $1.6 million. Interestingly enough, we are selling our condo-hotel condominiums in the newly created Hotel Plaza. And there the point of entry is in the $1.6, $1.7 million level.

Stribling is also marketing the new condos in One Hanson Place in Williamsburg and at One Brooklyn Bridge Park. Who is the typical buyer of luxury housing in Brooklyn right now?

I would say that, as you know, Brooklyn is a hot borough; and I think that the typical buyer is a young person who wants perhaps a little more sizzle in their steak for their purchase price. I think that Brooklyn is a fun community. It’s not, of course, as expensive as Tribeca, but it gives you the ambiance of downtown—whether it’s Greenwich Village as compared to Brooklyn Heights, whether it’s perhaps a more trendy Lower Manhattan as perhaps you might find in the Williamsburg section and so on.

So, you have a variety of neighborhoods in Brooklyn that are both family-oriented and singles-oriented and artistic-oriented.

Are there a lot of Manhattan buyers?

Yes, definitely. And I think who’s coming to One Hanson and to One Brooklyn Bridge Park, especially, are very up-and-coming young professionals.

You actually bought two penthouse condos in One Brooklyn Bridge, correct?

Correct.

And did you ever think you’d leave your fashionable townhouse on the Upper East Side for Brooklyn?

Well, I’m a longtime fan of Brooklyn. I’ve been going out to Brooklyn Academy of Music for 20 years. I’m a cook, so I’ve gone out to many of the different neighborhoods of Brooklyn searching for ingredients. I’ve always loved Brooklyn Heights. What got me to this building, One Brooklyn Bridge Park, was, I thought, when I left my townhouse to buy a condominium, I wanted to be high in the sky and I wanted to have fabulous views. And Manhattan will be at my feet.

Have you bought in the Plaza?

Well, the Plaza is for many, many extremely affluent buyers, and I am but a real estate broker. And I’m moving to Brooklyn.

Do you know the sales price per square foot in the Plaza right now?

We have reached almost $6,400. That’s the highest.

You’re kidding me.

No, I’m not kidding. I never kid.

While we still love the last issue of Haute Living, there is already a new one out. This issue features some of the most powerful women in Manhattan real estate.

Find out all you've ever wanted to know about Pam Liebman, Dottie Herman, Louise Sunshine, and Elizabeth Stribling, who provides this story about breaking into the industry.

And what about each woman's forecast for 2006? Not surprisingly, they're quite optimistic.

- Michael Calderone

"From now on, on the sheets that you give the customers, you should never put down square footage," said Michele Kleier, president of the real estate brokerage and management firm Gumley Haft Kleier Inc., at a staff meeting on March 22. "Because if you say it's 2,000 square feet and it turns out to be 1,500 square feet, [the buyer] can go after the seller for a reduction in price. The seller's not gonna want to do that, and they could sue you for misrepresenting. It's happened."

At Douglas Elliman and the Halstead Property Company, similar warnings have been made at staff meetings, and the square-footage issue has surfaced at two recent meetings of the Real Estate Board of New York.

In the Stribling suit, filed in State Supreme Court on Sept. 11, Peter M. Kaplan and his wife, Andrea Karambelas, charged that after signing a contract for Apartment 6B at 983 Park Avenue in June, "[We] were advised … that the measurements of some of the rooms were substantially smaller than the measurements that appear on the floor plan provided to [us] by the Broker Defendants." The complaint states that although the couple had been issued a listing sheet by Stribling that described the apartment as having an area of 3,300 square feet, City Building Department records reflect that the maximum gross floor area of the unit is only about 2,850 square feet.

Mr. Kaplan and Ms. Karambelas terminated their contract in mid-August and filed suit a month later against Stribling & Associates; Blanche Gutstein and Cindy Kurtin, two Stribling brokers involved with the deal; and Rita P. Wolfson, the seller of 6B, for at least $275,000–for their down payment of $250,000 and $25,000 in fees accrued in obtaining a home equity loan, and in architectural and legal costs.

What prompted the suit, according to court documents, was a refusal by Ms. Wolfson to honor the couple's request for 10 preclosing visits to the apartment, during which the buyers wanted to take measurements with their architect. "Upon information and belief, [Ms. Wolfson] committed acts in breach of the contract in order to aid the broker defendants in their fraudulent misrepresentations regarding the square footage and value of the apartment by preventing plaintiffs from discovering those fraudulent misrepresentations, so that they would not terminate the contract," the complaint reads.

Elizabeth Stribling, president of Stribling & Associates, said the square-footage dispute at 983 Park Avenue is an anomaly. "I've been in the business 30 years now, and this is the first time it's come up," she said. "We always give the approximate square footage. What we normally do is use the standard bible of the industry that's called the Select Register."

Stephen Rabinowitz, a real estate lawyer with Greenberg Traurig, said he has never had a case of underestimated apartment size. "Most people that we deal with think the best protection is a broker you trust," he said. "Most people spend enough time looking at things that they get a sense of whether you're getting a good value or not. I've rarely seen clients take a measuring tape to an apartment."

But there have been other reports of buyers discovering discrepancies in square footage, which were attributed to extensive renovations or out-of-date recordkeeping or lazy approximations. In general, brokers do not measure apartments themselves when they are a party to a sale.

"I have seen, with people's handout sheets, the square footage listed, but I don't think they're going to do that anymore," said one high-end co-op broker who requested anonymity. "The word got around about the Stribling thing, and nobody wants to get caught."

Upper West Side

Richardson-Neeson Clan Takes The Money And runs to Broadway. Natasha Richardson, who won a Tony award in 1998 for her role in Cabaret , and her husband, actor Liam Neeson, are not against making lots and lots of money very quickly.

Real estate sources said the couple recently sold their 14th-floor apartment at 91 Central Park West, near 69th Street, after a neighbor approached them with an offer they couldn't refuse: $2.2 million, which is $800,000 more than the couple paid for the two-bedroom apartment in 1994. According to sources, the couple and their two children have relocated temporarily to a three-bedroom apartment in the Park Millennium condo building on 67th Street, where they are paying $12,000 per month.

"Somebody gave them an outrageous offer to buy their apartment, and they had to do something in a hurry," said a source familiar with the couple's move. The deal–which was negotiated directly between buyer and seller–was final in late January, and their lease at the Park Millennium commenced on Feb. 1, the source said.

Mr. Neeson and Ms. Richardson bought the Central Park West co-op in 1994 for about $1.4 million. At the time, the apartment, which contains two bedrooms, a library and three baths, needed some work. At 2,300 square feet, the apartment was not exactly extravagant in size for the couple and their two young children. Real estate sources said that Mr. Neeson and Ms. Richardson were tempted by the $2.2 million offer, which came from another resident of the building–whose neighbors include Giorgio Armani (in the $2.85 million penthouse) and former Manhattan Borough President Ruth Messinger–who was looking for more space. Adding $800,000 to the 1994 selling price, brokers said, would have more than offset the cost of renovating the six-room spread. The couple had no comment on the sale.

155 West 70th Street

Three-bed, 2.5-bath, 1,880-square-foot condo.

Asking: $1.105 million. Selling: $1.195 million.

Charges: $841. Taxes: $917.

Time on the market: 10 weeks.

THEY'LL ALWAYS HAVE PFIZER. A Pfizer executive and his wife left Westport, Conn., for this condominium near Broadway in 1995. When a transfer to Morocco came along four years later, they were ready to move again. They put the condo on the market for $1.105 million–they had paid only $770,000–and shipped off to Casablanca, where they found a house and sent for their furniture. Just about this time, when the condo was supposed to be ready to show to interested buyers, the building's service elevator broke. The building's staff could only offer explanations about a special part having to be ordered, but brokers were pulling their hair out. The hapless boxed-up furniture was trapped in the condo, making the place too cluttered to possibly attract the right buyer. By the time the elevator was fixed, the owners were even considering just renting the place for now. Keanu Reeves and George Michael passed through, but didn't take it. Finally, the apartment sold to a couple in their 30's–the husband works on Wall Street–who signed a contract for $90,000 over the asking price within 24 hours of seeing the place. Broker: Douglas Elliman (Louise Phillips); Halstead Property Company (Vasco Da Silva).

Upper East Side

505 East 79th Street

Two-bed, two-bath, 1,400-square-foot postwar co-op.

Asking: $379,000. Selling: $362,000.

Charges: $1,334; 57 percent tax-deductible.

Time on the market: six weeks.

PAINT THE TOWN PINK. The earnest parents of a 4-year-old boy and a newborn girl decided that their kids each deserved their own bedroom on the Upper East Side. They had been renting for the last several years on East 74th Street near Second Avenue. "We started searching from Second Avenue and east, between 72nd and 86th," recalled the husband. "We saw horrible stuff. Some of them were wrecks, or they faced the wall … just nothing nice." Still, the couple were stalwart in their search, venturing even farther east. At last, they hit on this two-bedroom apartment on East 79th Street near York Avenue, with a dining room that said "little girl's room" to them. Because it was on a low floor, the price was more negotiable; they got it for $362,000. They'll do a fast renovation of the kitchen while painting the dining room pink and be in by the end of March. Broker: Harrison Properties Inc. (Harry Frank).

215 East 73rd Street

One-bed, one-bath, 900-square-foot prewar co-op.

Asking: $295,000. Selling: $295,000.

Charges: $1,170; 45 percent tax-deductible.

Time on the market: one day.

PROOF OF LIFE EAST OF THIRD AVENUE. Manhattan's co-op oligarchy isn't exactly democratic. Broker Meris Blumstein had this Bing & Bing-developed apartment near Third Avenue on the market only one day before an interested buyer came along. The seller gave him the nod, but the board didn't–prompting an appeal process that ended badly. With the aborted deal behind her, however, Ms. Blumstein forged ahead with a second open house that brought yet another interested buyer–this time, a couple in their mid-20's. They loved what the seller, a single man who was moving downtown, had done to the place: faux moldings that captured the building's original 1928 style and elaborate stereo and telephone wiring through the walls. Luckily, the couple–who got hitched on March 19–blushed all the way to board approval. Broker: Corcoran Group (Meris Blumstein).

480 Park Avenue

Two-bed, two-bath, 1,600-square-foot prewar co-op.

Asking: $995,000. Selling: $960,000.

Charges: $1,639; 37 percent tax-deductible.

Time on the market: 10 weeks.

SHE WON'T TAKE MANHATTAN. The single woman who bought this apartment, a co-op built in 1929 at the corner of 58th Street and Park Avenue, also has a home in Bergen County, N.J., and a winter place in Florida. Last year, she decided she needed a city pied-à-terre , too. But after repainting and furnishing the two-bedroom apartment–the previous owner had thoroughly renovated the place–she was not sufficiently charmed by Manhattan, so she put the co-op back on the market. The apartment's enormous foyer and views of the Four Seasons hotel attracted a single guy from Boston. He, too, will stick some new paint on the walls. Broker: Corcoran Group (Grace Williams and Heather Johnson Sargent).

Tribeca

160 Chambers Street

1,700-square-foot prewar loft co-op.

Asking: $595,000. Selling: $565,000.

Charges: $1,250; 69 percent tax-deductible.

Time on the market: 14 weeks.

FEAR OF LOFTS. Apparently, not everyone wants 1,700 square feet of raw TriBeCa loft space. The writer who recently purchased this loft on Chambers Street between Greenwich Street and West Broadway carried the contract around with her for a month before signing it. Even the fact that this 1862 converted co-op was a firehouse in a previous incarnation couldn't persuade her to act more quickly. There are four residential units, one per floor, and the penthouse owner rents out the ground floor to an Internet-based wine merchant. This apartment is totally unrenovated except for a bathroom, kitchen and one closet. The seller negotiated a deal for another TriBeCa loft that's twice the size, and the reluctant buyer won't be comfortable–and won't move in, in fact–until there are some walls up. Broker: Susan Penzner Real Estate (Steven Hauser); Douglas Elliman (Michael Chapman).