REAL ESTATE

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The vast landscapes of spec and custom houses in private ownership that need to be rented out by owners are the mainstay of today's rental housing inventory, from David's Lane to David White's Lane. For the most part, they fall into the so-called Trophy Home category. These same houses are typical of what's for sale as well.

At best, they all look alike. If you've been in one of the kitchens or master baths you've been in them all. But they're new, nearly antiseptic and sport all the modern gadgets and comforts, making the romantic notion of some musty shingled relic by the sea a charmless anachronism.

They don't always rent so easily, though. Often these architectural look-alikes include dramatic two-story spaces with stairways and spatial landings that are anathema to families with young children in the care of hapless nannies afraid their tykes might fall overboard.

Many are furnished so formally that they bear no resemblance to beach house ambiance. That the renting pool is largely 30-and 40-somethings, husbands wrapped in hedge fund mullah accompanied by gorgeous wives and precocious children, tastes have changed. Modern interiors, even in a Shingle-Style, but not gaudy or Miami influenced, are in demand.

The people who are shown these houses by fearless brokers are discerning to a fault and want only what they want. When they encounter houses more fitting for a cul de sac in Scarsdale they're often appalled. The East End is not necessarily a come-as-you-are sort of place anymore. Living as they do in vast lofts downtown or modish Park Avenue aeries, these local palaces of prosperity are not always so appealing. At $150,000 for an August rental or $350,000 for the season, the rental stock seems lackluster. Why pay Four Seasons prices to settle in dreary digs?

Taking in the universal picture, the Hamptons, at least through the looking glass, is alive and well. The streets are packed, the roads are jammed, the restaurants are booked solid and even the farmstands sell out the day's bounty fast.

So, if this year's rental market was surprisingly disappointing, it wasn't only touchy economics at fault but rather the beat of a new drum, a sense of style—the New Hamptons, if you will—looking for its heart. Perhaps this augers well for seasons to come. —S.D.