It’s been over two years since newly single Ben Affleck started apartment hunting in NYC, and now that he has a new love interest, he’s back at it. The Post reports that the actor and girlfriend Lindsay Shookus, a “Saturday Night Live” producer, checked out unit 26C in the Robert A.M. Stern-designed, celeb-filled 15 Central Park West. The three-bedroom unit, asking $39,000 a month, was rented by Mark Wahlberg in 2009 for $32,000 a month; Alex Rodriguez also bid on the unit last year, despite being banned from the building for allegedly hosting too many prostitutes while renting another apartment. Not known for any partying antics, Affleck will likely have better luck should he want to move forward with living in the city’s most expensive condo.

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15 Central Park West. Image: Wikimedia Commons

Even with a rapidly rising field of competitors, 15 Central Park West  still holds the title of New York City’s most expensive condominium, according to the just-released CityRealty100. Robert A.M. Stern’s “Limestone Jesus,” built in 2007, has many a superlative under its limestone-clad belt, but the one that puts it in the top spot tallies the eight apartments sold in the past year for an average price per square foot of $7,227. 15 Central Park West also grabbed the top three most expensive sales by PPSF, with the $50.5 million Penthouse 40B, sold by Barclay’s CEO Bob Diamond to an unnamed Chinese buyer, topping the list at $9,581/square foot.

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British rocker Sting and his wife Trudie Styler have listed their chic duplex at the Robert A.M. Stern-designed 15 Central Park West for $56 million (h/t WSJ). The couple purchased the 16th- and 17th-floor penthouse for about $27 million in 2008, and then enlisted architecture and interior design firm SheltonMindel to combine the units and transform them into a “unique home” that includes two custom sculptural spiral staircases and a double-sided spiral gas fireplace that was inspired by the Fibonacci Spiral. Last summer, the couple was in negotiations to buy another Stern condo at 220 Central Park South, one of NYC’s most expensive apartment buildings, and now that they “need more space to accommodate their growing family” the time may be ripe to do so.

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Even after countless big ticket closings at blockbuster buildings like 432 Park Avenue and The Greenwich Lane, the long-admired Robert A.M. Stern-designed, Zeckendorf-developed 15 Central Park West (15 CPW) remains king. According to CityRealty’s latest CR100 report—an index comprised of the top 100 condominium buildings in Manhattan—units in 15 CPW sold on average for $6,735 per square foot over 12 months, a number that is impressively higher than the index average of $2,824. Tribeca’s Herzog & de Meuron-designed “Jenga tower,” 56 Leonard also made its debut on the latest CR100, clocking an average price per square foot of $2,657.

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The most expensive apartment closing in New York City this year and one of the priciest sales ever is finally a done deal, reports The Real Deal. The apartment, the top penthouse at Rafael Viñoly-designed billionaire’s bunker 432 Park Avenue, is the priciest unit in the big-ticket building as well as being literally the city’s highest. As 6sqft previously reported, the buyer is Saudi retail magnate Fawaz Al Hokair. The sale price was $87.7 million—a skyscraping $10,623 per square foot.

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The NY Post reports that Sting and Trudie Styler are in negotiations to purchase a condo in the Robert A.M. Stern-designed 220 Central Park South. The tantric twosome aren’t new to the parkside circuit; they’re currently among the significant celebrity contingent at the also-Stern-designed 15 Central Park West, where the pop star purchased a 5,413- square-foot penthouse for $26.5 million in 2008.

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Yankee Alex Rodriguez was recently spotted checking out apartments at 15 Central Park West, according to the Post. A-Rod had formerly rented a $30,000 a month, two-bedroom apartment at the Upper West Side building and was allegedly banned from returning due to his propensity for hosting (many, many) hookers back in his Cameron Diaz era.

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