Month: February 2021

It’s February 2nd, a day after the East End was pounded with snow and wind. It’s 40 degrees out, drizzly and gray. Tomorrow’s forecast: drizzly and gray. Ah, the glamorous Hamptons in the off-season.

But don’t, friends and neighbors, get your hopes up too high when you head to Citarella to pick up a few trifles. Reports Vanity Fair, “demand for truffles, uni, and caviar has ‘doubled to tripled’ due to ‘a different type of winter than ever before,’ said a Citarella spokesperson. At times, she said, the store has sold out completely.” SHOCK HORROR. (Seriously, we’re not surprised. We were in Citarella East Hampton on Christmas Eve and the queue for caviar was a dozen people.) Can’t someone fly in some emergency truffles via Blade or something? What’s the point of being a rich Hamptonite if our desires are not immediately met?

Also apparently running low? Ammunition. We too love hunting the Poors for sport, but we’d like to remind fellow citizens that you’re supposed to use blanks. It’s bad form otherwise.

Not running low? Septic systems. Apparently cityfolk, with their fancy sewers, don’t know that their country pile’s sanitary system periodically needs a call from the stool bus. Systems are backing up and lawns are seeping. “Quackenbush said the company has hauled 30% more waste from residential tanks since March 2020,” reports Vanity Fair.

And if things weren’t bad enough, East Hampton Village beach parking permits–free to village residents–are now $500 for the hoi polloi, up from $400 last year. Fumed one homeowner, “They are nickel-and-diming all the joy out of the community.” Listen, folks, let’s all just relax and have some lumpfish roe on our blinis. Summer is coming.

It’s no secret that real estate sales in the Hamptons are at fever pitch; less often reported on is the robust rental market. To see how much rentals have appreciated in the past few years, we decided to compare 2013 rentals with what’s on offer today.

Back in the day, we wrote an annual series of blog posts called The Summer Rental Roundup in which modest, average, and expensive rentals for each town were chosen to feature. In Montauk, a 600 square foot waterfront cottage was $13,200, Memorial Day to Labor Day. The only thing we could find comparable now was someone’s Ditch Plains basement, 650 square feet, for $16,000. There’s also a condo, 675 square feet, for $21,000.

390 Old Montauk Highway was for rent that year, asking $360,000 MD-LD. It is again this year, only now the price is $650,000. So let’s do some math, shall we? A lower priced rental is 40% more expensive than in 2013, while a higher-end is 80% more expensive.

Now let’s look at East Hampton. The medium priced rental, 4 Copeces Lane, was listed for $80,000 MD-LD. For summer 2021, 4 Copeces is available for a cool $150,000. The high-end property, 211 Lily Pond Lane, which was $425,000, is not available this year; and–nothing. There are no oceanfront East Hampton properties available for rent on either HamptonsRE or OutEast. Wow. The highest priced East Hampton Village rental we could find is $670,000 for a new-build, July-LD, on Davids Lane (pictured above). Nice but nowhere near the ocean. So for the math, we’re going to say a medium rental is 85% more expensive in 2021 than in 2013.

Now let’s check out Southampton. The lower-end property was 231 Halsey Street, at $50,000 for MD-LD. 231 Halsey is not available this summer, but you could spend $35,000 a month renting it for March or April. 65 Pelham Street is close to Halsey and comparable; it too has four bedrooms, five baths, and a gunite pool. You could nab 65 Pelham for July-LD for $125,000. The high-end property in Southampton, 396 Meadow Lane, was $800,000 for MD-LD. In 2021, it’s $850,000 for MD-LD. Finally, a bargain! A lower-end rental is 150% more expensive now than in 2013, while a higher-end one is just 6.25%.

To sum up: yep. Things cost a lot more now. More so on the lower and medium end than the high end, we’d say. After all, if you’re going to shell out a fortune renting, why not just buy? Something those East Hampton oceanfront owners seem to be taking to heart.