Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Downtown co-op lofts: no dog spas, but many can be had for under $1,000 per square foot.

As I’ve discussed earlier, there is a much greater difference between co-ops and condos downtown than there is in the rest of Manhattan.  At least on the inside.

Anywhere else in Manhattan, if you want to know if an apartment is a co-op or a condo, you have to ask somebody.

In Soho, Noho and Nolita, it's pretty obvious.  Nearly all the condos in these neighborhoods are either new conversions that retain their original facades but are completely gutted and reconstructed on the inside, or newly constructed from the ground up. 

The co-ops are a different matter.  They’re real artists’ lofts which were factories and warehouses made habitable by the pioneer artists who settled there forty or fifty years ago.

Because the condos are new and shiny and have such weird amenities (weird to the pioneers, at least) as doormen and exercise rooms and wine cellars and dog spas, their prices are much higher. 

Another reason for condos’ higher prices is their current popularity.  Suddenly, everybody wants a condo.  And there are far fewer condos than co-ops.  (A good case can be made for either, depending on your needs, but that’s a subject for another time.)

For the last twelve months, the average price per square foot for a co-op loft in Soho, Noho and Nolita has been $1,047, as opposed to about $1,750 for a condo.

The highest PPSF for a co-op loft was $1,623 for a 2400 s.f. high full floor at 458 Broadway, with 2.5 baths, in mint condition, with 24 windows spread along both a long wall and a short wall.

The lowest PPSF, $521, was for a second floor loft at 620 Broadway that faced east over Crosby Street. 

The foot print of the 620 Broadway loft is about 2400 square feet, but the typically high (15 feet in this case) ceilings of a second floor allow for another 700 square feet or so of mezzanine which brings the total square footage up to the listed 3146.  I didn’t see this one, but the condition was given as excellent.  

It's a gray area as to whether mezzanine square footage should be counted as the ceilings in the mezzanine areas are lower than the 8' required by the Department of Buildings, so the price per square foot here may be artificially reduced. 

The lack of light here would be a problem for many buyers.  Note that the indentations on the south wall are not windows. 

They used to be lot line windows--that is, windows in a wall that sits on the very edge of the lot--that looked over a gas station, but the gas station gave way to a big glass-curtain-walled commercial building with a huge Adidas store on the ground floor, and the windows are no more.  Thus the perils of lot-line windows.


The median price was $1,160, for a 2000 s.f. fifth floor loft at 325 Lafayette Street.  This was an extremely odd shape for a loft; it’s a trapezoid, and very narrow at one end.  It needed a complete gut renovation.

The clients I showed it to were put off by the configuration,  but it gets a huge amount of light and has windows on all sides except the really short wall where the elevator and the stairs are.  

Another huge advantage of this loft is that the maintenance is basically cab fare--$600 a month.  The building has no underlying mortgage, and the tenant share-holders derive income from the commercial space on the ground floor.


Here’s the spreadsheet:



SOHO NOHO NOLITA CLOSED CO-OP SALES, $1,000,000+  MAY 2011--MAY 2012
ADDRESSAPT SFS&C PRICE$PSFCLOSEDMAINT ENANCE
458 Broadway72387$3,875,000 $1,6233/7/12$2,800
117 Prince 3C2300$3,100,000 $1,3483/22/12$2,200
48 Great Jones 3F2303$3,100,000 $1,3464/5/12$2,250
458 Broadway4FL2387$3,200,000 $1,3411/5/12$2,800
682 Broadway3FL3000$4,000,000 $1,3338/25/11$4,270
45 Crosby 6N1955$2,600,000 $1,33011/22/11$1,850
114 Spring41581$2,100,000 $1,3286/29/11$2,500
114 Spring 3FLR1662$2,200,000 $1,3243/19/12$2,500
477 Broome 431111$1,430,000 $1,2879/14/11$1,686
541 Broadway4B3200$4,100,000 $1,2815/23/11$200
292 Lafayette 7W1433$1,820,000 $1,2701/11/12$2,235
66 Crosby 4B1540$1,950,000 $1,2661/10/12$1,593
45 Crosby 4N1955$2,475,000 $1,2668/19/11$1,850
22 Wooster 4C3000$3,750,000 $1,2508/5/11$3,911
652 Broadway7R1500$1,850,000 $1,2331/13/12$603
431 W. Broadway4FL2000$2,375,000 $1,1887/21/11$1,300
27 Howard4TH2000$2,325,000 $1,1637/28/11$3,100
325 Lafayette5FL2000$2,320,000 $1,1604/21/12$600
135 Greene 5S2600$2,950,000 $1,1357/19/11$2,100
424 Broome52200$2,449,000 $1,1135/25/11$1,680
468 W.Broadway5D1571$1,700,000 $1,0824/18/12$2,005
101 Wooster 3F1951$2,060,000 $1,0568/10/11$2,094
712 Broadway22600$2,700,000 $1,0387/14/11$3,622
543 Broadway42148$2,225,000 $1,0364/4/12$0
113 Princ Street5ER1350$1,390,000 $1,0308/18/11$1,333
307 W. Broadway7FL3200$3,175,000 $9924/23/12$1,650
16 Crosby 3RN2200$2,180,000 $9918/30/11$83
135 Greene 4S2650$2,625,000 $9915/23/12$2,100
114 Mercer4R2250$2,225,000 $9894/13/12$2,810
242 Lafayette 4S1480$1,412,500 $9541/5/12$2,215
561 Broadway5A2100$2,000,000 $95212/14/11$3,400
16 Crosby2F2722$2,375,000 $87310/28/11$67
565 Broadway34184$3,600,000 $8601/26/12$6,834
45 Crosby 5N1955$1,625,000 $8314/26/12$1,850
141 Wooster 3C1760$1,453,000 $82610/11/11$2,100
81 Grand3FLR1575$1,200,000 $7621/19/12$2,000
307 W. Broadway6FL3300$2,450,000 $7425/15/12$1,500
182 Grand 2E2000$1,420,000 $7106/30/11$1,897
48 Great Jones 2NDFL4400$3,100,000 $7055/17/12$4,500
710 Broadway6TH2283$1,540,000 $6753/21/12$3,057
712 Broadway3RD2400$1,600,000 $66711/16/11$3,622
100 Wooster5TH2875$1,800,000 $6267/11/11$3,000
55 Great Jones3RD2100$1,250,000 $5951/5/12$0
620 Broadway2R3146$1,637,500 $52111/19/11$2,317
AVERAGE$1,047

 
See related link    http://withconfidence.blogspot.com/2011/12/what-are-best-co-ops-in-soho.html


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