Buying a five-bedroom Upper West Side co-op is quite a step up—or rather, a climb up a simulated vertical incline—for SoulCycle co-founder Julie Rice.
Ms. Rice and husband Spencer, who works in marketing at Civic Entertainment group, have just purchased a $3.8 million apartment at 310 West End Avenue. The couple’s duplex loft at 130 Jane Street in the West Village, most recently asking $2.3 million, is in contract. And while it looks picture perfect (right down to the astro-turfed patio), with just two-bedrooms and a open, all-in-one floor plan, it was clearly the starter home of a spinning guru. (Albeit, it was a step up from the friend’s rent-controlled apartment that the family first stayed in when they moved from L.A.)
The new place, all 2,800-square-feet of it, with building bones by Emery Roth and recent renovation worthy of a West Elm catalog, clearly says biking bigwig, from the spa-like master bath to the staff room right next to the washer/dryer. It is wheely nice.
Ms. Rice must have pedaled furiously to close this deal, as the apartment was on the market for $3.95 million with Corcoran broker Maria Manuche a mere 13 days before the deal closed. Not that it was the property’s first time around the block. The apartment bounced around the market for more than a year with a different brokerage and slightly higher price. Unlike Ms. Rice, seller Craig Reicher is not, it would seem, very adept at selecting the ideal cultural moment for a sale.
Why did the couple decide to move so far uptown? We really can’t say. Maybe after years of cycling in place, never going anywhere, the Rices just needed a change of scenery. Bonus points for being located so close to the Hudson River Greenway bike path. Who knows? The Rices might even start biking outside.
kvelsey@observer.com
