Here's How Much It Would Really Cost To Live Like Midge Maisel

For some people, the idea of living in an apartment one floor below the apartment in which they grew up, where their parents still happen to live — as Midge Maisel did in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel — might not sound like a dream scenario. Looking at her luxury apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side, however, we can think of a few reasons why it actually would be totally ideal.

According to The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's set designer Bill Groom, the two apartments where much of the show takes place, one of which belonged to Midge and her husband Joel and the other where Midge's parents Rose and Abe live, are each made up of seven rooms. Anyone who has spent time in New York City knows that a seven-room apartment is quite an extravagance, especially in Manhattan. Getting to settle down in an apartment of that size would be a dream scenario for most New Yorkers regardless of who the neighbors are.

Aside from size, the apartment where Midge and Joel are living when viewers meet them at the start of season 1 is impeccably designed. During a recent interview with Refinery29, Groom explained that he and his team used Midge’s personality and history to inspire the decor of her home, which led them to give it a "contemporary sensibility." He also points out that viewers will notice Midge's kitchen is more modern than Rose’s, despite them having nearly identically laid out apartments. "The one thing that seems to change every decade is the kitchen and that has to do partly with the technology and the development of the appliances… So, you see that in the show. Rose's apartment is much more original to the building that was built in the early teens on the Upper West Side. Midge’s kitchen is one that’s been renovated in the 50s when she would have moved in," Groom revealed.

Unsurprisingly, Midge and Joel's stunning home would have cost them a pretty penny. Groom told Refinery29 that the apartments were inspired by a real building on Riverside Drive. We reached out to StreetEasy to find out a little bit more about the spot, and the New York City real estate website shared that its exact address is 404 Riverside Drive. The building, which is known as The Strathmore, was built in 1909 and holds 48 units, each as impressive as the next.

According to StreetEasy, two of the building's units, 12N and 12CD, would together have been comparable to the 7-room apartment Groom and his team created for Midge and her family. Both units were sold separately in 2017, but their prices together would come to a whopping $8,850,000 USD.

While we know that Midge's family was well-off, apparently thanks to Abe's career as a Columbia math professor, the Weissmans wouldn't have dropped $8 million on their family home. Back in the late 1950s, when the show takes place, living on the Upper West Side in an apartment like the Strathmore would have been expensive, of course, but it wouldn't have cost millions. According to StreetEasy, home prices in New York have increased by roughly 19 times since 1959, based on data from the U.S. Census and the S&P Case Shiller Home Price Index. With that in mind, the real estate website estimates that the Maisel apartment would have been worth approximately $462,000 in 1959. With a price tag like that, it's no wonder Midge was less than thrilled when she found out Joel's father had been the one to pay for it.

Still, with sprawling space, gorgeous home decor, and a kitchen equipped with the time's most cutting-edge technology, it's clear that constant easy access to babysitting wasn’t the only reason Midge Maisel was eager to move in downstairs from her parents. All those perks have us wishing we too could live in one of the apartments from the show, even if it meant having to sleep in Midge's childhood twin bed. Unfortunately, though, living in Midge and Joel's or Rose and Abe's actual homes is impossible because, according to Groom, they're not real. Groom told Refinery29 that The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's apartments were built on a studio stage. "We shot the pilot at a location on the Upper West Side, which we worked to match on the stage," he explained.