The son of former Tel Aviv Mayor Shlomo Lahat, Adv. Dan Lahat and his family have moved to a house in the city center. The house is actually half of a three-floor building slated for preservation on Karl Netter St. Until a few years ago, Lahat family and families like them would have preferred to buy a house out of town, or overlook the city from one of the top floors in a luxury high-rise.
Realtors who work with a clientele who can afford whatever they want, and the architects who design homes for them, told "Globes" that in the past year, more and more wealthy families want to buy homes consolidated from several apartments in a building on a bustling Tel Aviv street.
A few weeks ago, real estate tycoon Igal Ahouvi bought an apartment bloc on Ben Zakkai St., which he is reportedly planning to demolish and replace with a private house for his family.
"This is a new trend for the rich," says Rina Lahat, who, after completing her family's move, opened a real estate agency that deals in buildings slated for preservation. "The rich are beginning to discover the beauty of living in the city, in large spaces, in homes of amazing architectural worth."
Single homes flourished in Tel Aviv's early decades. Most of them were built in the 1920s through the 1940s, and have one or two floors. They are apparently now making a come-back.
Why now? Perhaps because of an awareness of the need to save energy or a wish to avoid sitting for hours in traffic jams between the office and home. Or perhaps the rich are sick and tired of living far from the center of business and cultural action.
In addition, the UNESCO declaration of Tel Aviv's White City as a World Heritage Site, improved its image and turned buildings slated for preservation into something worth having in the eyes of the rich who want to own a dream house with historic and nostalgic value.
The new trend has also received a boost from foreign residents, including wealthy Jews, who want to buy a home in the city. Urban houses with historic value are found in London, Paris, and New York and foreign residents for whom price is not a consideration are seeking local real estate attractions.
The super-rich seeking urban houses don’t need it as a place to live. In most cases, they already own several such homes around the world. A special house is family "jewel" and they will pay for the preservation and upkeep one million after another. It's the ostentatiousness of the rich, a kind of "look at me", says Neot Shiran Luxury Home Specialty Marketers agent Eyal Price. "They have no limits. The people going to the high-rises are older, they want the guards, and it's easier for them to lock the apartment and go abroad."
This is apparently why they are not bothered by buying a house slated for preservation, because the standards for renovating these houses is the price, dictated by the municipality preservation department. On paper, this translated into more paper and more time. A preservation contractor says that preservation adds 20-30% to the cost of construction and renovation.
What are the treats of an urban house? Like in any other community for the super-rich, it will have a swimming pool in the basement or on the roof, a movie room, a $150,000 kitchen, soft water systems, a noise-proof room, and an ornamental garden costing thousands of dollars.
This is an abridged version of a Hebrew article in the current edition of "Globes" weekend magazine "G".
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on January 3, 2008
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