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Excess used to be fun. Suddenly, it’s starting to look scary.
Extravagance is practically synonymous with the Hamptons. We like hefty, sumptuous houses; lively, opulent parties; stylish, crowded restaurants. We like the convenience of buying diamonds on Main Street, and the fulfillment of relentlessly, perpetually pampering ourselves. We don’t even mind the fuzzbuzz of traffic as long as the cars look classy.
If there is such a thing as excess wealth, it found a natural home here. We have it and we flash it, especially in our homes. This is an accomplishment society, proud of itself, eager to build it big, buy it big and ballyhoo it big. New money drives real estate, and until very recently the real estate market was sizzling.
Old money here does not have to go back generations. A decade or two is enough. It conveniently maintains the standards of moderation and good taste and lets the arrivistes off the hook. The gold standard of a fine home in the estate area of Southampton or East Hampton is not the benchmark it once was. Traditional location matters less than it used to. Mass and measurements, hedonism and high living, all the accumulated goodies supersede the right address.
But even excess has its limits. Our lighthearted excess is taking on a dark side. Sprawling houses here and there used to be amusing. But when they are lined up in an expensively landscaped row that used to be a potato field, they lose their allure. And when they invade the tree-lined village lanes, gobbling yards and obscuring the sky, they seem unvarying and unwelcoming.
Yet the market demands it. And builders and brokers promote it. But even those brokers are part of the excess. With acquisition of the former Schneider agency, Corcoran now has 475 sales associates with duplicate and triplicate offices in some towns.
The redundancy in offices and agents is certainly more than the market can bear, and plans are in the works for closing or consolidating local offices with the Corcoran brand. The real estate business has an excess of everything except buyers. And it’s not just numbers. Real estate is a bitchy business these days. Agents compete for jobs and desks as well as customers. Some will be tending bar and passing hors d’oeuvres by next summer.
Is it possible that the urge to excess has run its course? Will we soon retreat to our sublimely decorated poolhouses and look back and smile about the days when anything worth doing was worth overdoing? Will we be ashamed of gas-guzzling SUVs and 30,000 square foot weekend houses with air conditioned garages and chemical drenched lawns? Nostalgic for days when we could waste money, waste resources, and waste time, and get seamless, guiltless gratification in return?
It seemed so innocent at the beginning. Just some Wall Street traders and hedge fund managers showering money on their summer pleasures. Excess was such fun. Who could imagine that by the end of summer 2006, it would begin to turn treacherous? Who could predict that a lifestyle practically invented in the Hamptons would start to scare us?