Tokyo

Though the strength of the Euro has been largely credited with staving off a housing market nosedive in Manhattan, it is hitting expatriate American businessmen (and the multi-national companies they work for) stationed in cities like London, Hong Kong and Moscow hard, pushing already expensive rents into the stratosphere, according to Forbes’ survey of the most expensive international rental markets.

Mercer Human Resource Consulting checked out the median rent of Class A, unfurnished apartments, in high-end neighborhoods of commercial hubs around the globe and adjusted them from local currencies to the dollar. The “results spell trouble for businesses dealing in (greenbacks).”

Hong Kong, which ranked No. 1 in the survey, saw the median monthly rent rise from $4,898 to $6,398 between 2006 and 2007, when adjusted to the dollar. Tokyo was the second priciest market with a median rent of $4,102 per month. With a $1,000 rent increase year-over-year, Moscow ranked third, matching the $4,000 median rent in New York--the fourth most-expensive rental market. London rounded out the top five at $3,889.  read more »

Manhattan office-market stats out last week showed what everyone already knows: The borough has one  read more »

By the end of the week, Al Gore will have finished training the last of a thousand "Climate Project" volunteers, who will be charged with spreading the word about the bleaker aspects of 70-degree January days.

According to Gore's office, the former vice president has been busy indoctrinating said volunteers for more than ten hours a day, and will now, at last, be free to do... other things.

No, says his office, not that -- despite the latest speculation.

On Thursday, Gore plans to fly to Tokyo to stroll down the red carpet for the opening of An Inconvenient Truth. After that he is off to Scotland, Denmark and England to do more movie promotion. (London, it turns out, will also be the headquarters for the European branch of Gore's growing volunteer network.)

And then, without so much as a breather, Gore will begin promoting his next book, "The Assault on Reason," which is scheduled to hit stores in May.

Sounds like he's campaigning for something, anyway.

--Jason Horowitz

UPDATE: From Gore's spokesperson Kalee Kreider, the following:

"The vice president has been clear that his campaign is really about the issue of global warming and we are currently evaluating whether or not to continue the training program after the UK, but he currently has no intention of running for office in 2008."

Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Babel, from a screenplay by Guillermo Arria  read more »

Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Babel, from a screenplay by Guillermo Arriaga (in English, Spanis  read more »

• Any event called "architecture's version of speed dating" sounds like a surefire bad idea. But if it's official name is Pecha Kucha--and if it started in Tokyo before coming to Queens--you cannot go wrong. Especially if you like consuming 20 images of future condos (or artsy sculptures) every 400 seconds. Plus, there's beer. (Architectural Record)
• The Sun has a fascinating expose of the correct nomenclature and precise boundaries of Nolita. Apparently, "the arbiters of trendy" (and also the "real estate lobby") get to define neighborhoods as they see fit. (Sun)
• The Post's 'Hood of the Week is Alphabet City ("Alphabet Superb"). Why? Because "wretched slums" and "needle parks" have given way to "fresh air" and "luxe rentals." Plus, the Far East is "hipster-friendly"! (NY Post)
• Welcome to 515 East 72nd Street, the city's very first "inspired living residence." This high-rise condo will treat you to its spa and wellness programming (thus we must use the title "spadominium.") Yet isn't Zen luxury a wee bit 1993? (NY Times)
- Max Abelson
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For anyone upset that there was no IMterview on Friday, here is a longer-than-usual excerpt from Hillary's speech yesterday at the Jewish Community Relations Council's annual legislative breakfast at the 92nd Street Y.

Hillary connects the port security issue with the national economy. Then, while not exactly promising to an IMterview in the future, she does sound eager to chat about all this real soon.

"Let me say a word about port security because I think it is emblematic of a larger problem...I don't think any member of congress will tell you we've done all we know we need to do. We've made some hard trade offs. I would argue some of the reasons we've had to make those trade offs is because we've gone from a balanced budget and a surplus to a deficit and an increasing debt. So that every day today we borrow two billion dollars and we borrow it from foreign lenders to pay the interest on our debt. So when we go hat in hand, to Beijing, and Seoul, Tokyo,and Riyadh, and the Caribbean banking centers and other gulf states to borrow money to feed our inability to control our fiscal future, we cede some of our fiscal sovereignty. And we force ourselves into what I consider false choices. The choice is do we do everything we know we need to do on port security, or not."

She went on to say:

"There are those who say we can't do it [prevent foreign governments from operating U.S. ports] because look what happened in the last 20 year. Foreign governments already control our ports, the Signaporean government. You know, we have the Chinese running the Panama Canal. We have other government-controlled entities controlling our ports. Well, just because it's been happening doesn't mean we should let it continue. And this is an area where I believe we should have a good, vigorous public debate."

--Azi Paybarah

NAI Global, a network of some 300 commercial real-estate firms, released an enormous report today (which we hope to link to here shortly in PDF form).

But the highlight appears to be its ranking of the top 10 most expensive markets for retail space in the world. Midtown Manhattan is the only New York market to make the list, clocking in at no. 8--and if you look at the prices per square foot (listed below for each of the top 10 markets), it's phenomenally cheaper than the seven ranked above it.

The numbers:

Hong Kong, China: $696.44 Tokyo, Japan:$208.89 Bejing, China: $183.39 Seoul, South Korea: $160.59 Vancouver, BC: $134.61 Shanghai, China: $133.78 Taipei, Taiwan: $130.76 Jakarta, Indonesia: $114.04 New York City-Midtown: $85.67 Melbourne, Australia: $80.62

- Tom McGeveran

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