Taylor Swift's $45,000-a-month New York town house that inspired song is put up for rent

The New York City town house that inspired Taylor Swift’s song Cornelia Street has been put up for rent, costing $45,000 a month.

The home in West Village, Manhattan, was rented by the star in 2016, as was made famous by the track from her 2019 album Lover thanks to the lyric: “‘I rent a place on Cornelia Street,’ I say casually in the car.”

The property is listed by luxury real estate agency The Corcoran Group, which posted the advertisement earlier this week.

The brownstone townhouse was first built in the 1870s as a carriage house, the listing states, and has since been renovated into a luxury property. It has four bedrooms, five full bathrooms and two half bathrooms, and a 30-foot swimming pool, as well as an exterior patio.

The spacious living room features “beamed ceilings, blond parquet Russian ipe wood floors, leaded glass windows and a wood-burning fireplace with a marble hearth”, according to the listing.

The dining room boasts “floor-to-ceiling casement windows [which] open on to tranquil West Village backyard views”.

There’s also a rooftop terrace with a “gabled roof structure and enjoy open views of downtown”.

The Corcoran Group shared a video tour of the apartment on TikTok and Instagram, which many of the star’s fans were quick to comment on.

“If we split it 5000 ways we can get it!!” one person said.

Another made light of the recent Ticketmaster controversy around Swift’s concert tickets. “Is there a queue to rent it? I’ve already been traumatised enough,” they wrote.

Another fan said: “The way I’d cry just remembering that Taylor walked the same floor.”

In a 2019 interview with Vulture, the home’s former owner David Aldea, said although he did not initially know who Swift was when he first rented the space to her, she instantly loved it.

“She walked in, and I’ll never forget this — she said: ‘Oooh, it’s so crafty,’” Aldea, who owned the property for 15 years, said. “And in Taylor-speak, that means ‘I like everything.’ She asked if she could rent not just the house but my style as well. So towels and dishes and glassware and furniture and just kind of ‘Take your clothes and go.’ So I did. She was an absolute delight to deal with.”

Taylor Swift's style evolution in 59 photos: from 'Fearless' to 'Folklore'

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”