New York's Cooperative and Condominium Community

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There are three critical elements of any successful underlying mortgage refinancing: planning, pricing, and processing. If you're planning to refinance your underlying mortgage, read on to see how you can make the process go as smoothly as possible.

Energy Detective: The Case of the Busted Boiler

Written by Tom Sahagian on February 02, 2015

New York City

My friend Octavia was in a quandary. "I need a new boiler," she informed me, "but I don't know how big it should be."

"If I had to surmise, I'd say probably a lot smaller than what it is now," I offered somewhat drily. "How big is the existing one, and by the way, how do you know you need a new one?"

Before replying directly, Octavia reminded me of the facts concerning her 25-unit building. The heating plant, which provided both heat and domestic hot water (DHW), was 50 boiler horsepower (BHP). It was now leaking water out of the back end. The heating season was a month away, and she had two fairly old bids in hand: one for another 50-horse unit, and the other for a 60-horse unit!

A wistful sigh escaped my lips, unfortunately loud enough for her to hear. "Did I say something wrong?" she asked, a hint of annoyance in her voice.

With its bright lights and bombastic reputation, New York City is a bustling place. It's the last place you'd expect to have peace and quiet. But that doesn't stop the noise from rankling many of its residents. It may well be called the city that never sleeps with good reason, but that doesn't change the fact that many of us have to be up at 6 a.m. or earlier (ouch) to get ready for work. And if New Yorkers are good at something, it's complaining.

Michael Lentin, owner of CitiQuiet (soundproof windows), has mapped the neighborhoods with the most 311 calls and why people complain.

New York City's Façade Inspection Safety Program (FISP), also called Local Law 11, requires that owners of buildings with six or more stories above an exposed basement wall undergo an exterior inspection every five years. The law is currently in its seventh cycle, but after February 21, Cycle 8 will begin, and boards will want to confirm with their management companies that all the necessary steps are taken to ensure that all reports and supplemental forms are submitted. 

Included with the Cycle 7 reports, all buildings that need to comply with Local Law 11 now have to go one step further and inspect all balconies, terraces, handrails, canopies, antennae, satellite dishes, air conditioners, and fire escapes and file a supplemental statement.

It's the issue that no one on the board wants to talk about, but it can't be avoided: residents are getting older. And with older communities come new problems – but maybe there are new solutions, too.

Susan Birenbaum is one of an underrepresented group of professionals known as Geriatric Care Managers (GCMs). Different from a home health aide, a geriatric care manager acts as a liaison between relatives of elderly residents and those that care for them – doctors, home aides, therapists, and more. 

Last week we looked at some key areas where boards tend to defer maintenance. Plumbing was number one on the list — and it's a tricky one. It's easy to see why people don't address plumbing problems until they happen, being that you have to break through walls to access problematic pipes. And people are probably not going to be keen on having you tear up their bathroom "just" for some routine maintenance.

Yet performing regular preventive maintenance can reduce overall yearly costs for plumbing repairs. Here are the areas in which you can stay ahead of plumbing problems.

If you want a snapshot of how New York's property management field has changed over the past quarter-century, you should look into the history of Cooper Square Realty. When Dan Wurtzel joined the fledgling company in 1987, he was one of four employees. Today, he's president of the New York operation of FirstService Residential, which purchased a stake in Cooper Square in 2003 and later formed partnerships with Wentworth New York and Goodstein Management. With 400 employees and more than 500 properties in its portfolio, FirstService Residential is now the largest management firm in the city.

A subsidiary of Toronto-based FirstService Corp., FirstService Residential operates in 21 states and has more than 12,000 employees. 

Warning Signs: When Your Building's Financials Are Late

Written by Stuart Saft on January 27, 2015

New York City

Waiting for the fiscal year to end is why so many co-ops and condos have their annual meetings in May and June. The annual financial statements should be delivered by the accountant to the board and the shareholders or unit-owners within four months of the end of the fiscal year (usually by April 30 if the fiscal year is also the calendar year). However, if the fiscal year is not the calendar year, the financial statements will be due later than April 30. The annual meeting should be held after the financial statements are received so the unit-owners and shareholders have an opportunity to review them prior to the annual meeting when the auditor can answer questions about them.

Maybe not everyone in New York is a fan of all the new condos going up, but sometimes good does come out of the inconvenience of noisy construction sites. Founded by Polish immigrants from Mezritch in 1910, the Adas Yisroel Anshe Mezritch Synagogue fell into such a state of disrepair it was forced to close its doors six months ago. But before you lament yet another piece of New York history gone, good news. The synagogue is being completely renovated and is scheduled to open its doors again this year, thanks to a new condo plan, reports the New York Daily News. The temple will remain on the ground floor, and "three luxe apartments, including one 11-foot penthouse addition, will be built upstairs" and are scheduled to hit the market this fall. Not everyone is happy about turning part of a religious building "over to for-profit real estate developers," but thanks to the controversial deal, at least the building and the shul will be preserved. According to the Daily News, East River Partners (the developer) "is also planning to pay an annual maintenance fee to keep the shul running for 200 more years." That's a pretty neat compromise.

Photo by Nicholas Strini for Property Shark.

It's easy to forget that one of the byproducts of all this new condo construction is disruption of life as usual — unless you live across the street from it, that is. Take the rental building across the street from a luxury condo that is under construction. One of its tenants wrote to Ronda Kaysen's latest "Ask Real Estate" column in The New York Times explaining that a structure has been erected in front of the rental building to accommodate fire trucks from the station, likewise across the street from the construction site. According to the tenant, "taxis, cars and moving trucks can no longer pull up to the front of the building…. [and] traffic [has been] diverted to a small lane next to this structure, creating unsafe conditions for drivers and pedestrians." It's a political question, explains Kaysen, adding that the tenant could contact the Department of Transportation (DOT), or better yet the local community board or elected officials. But the bottom line is that, very likely, "the condo is an as-of-right development, which means that it was not subject to a public review process where the community would have had the opportunity to weigh in on practical matters like where to house fire trucks. This might explain why the structure seemingly rose out of thin air." It's something for existing co-ops and condos to keep in mind, especially since next time, one of those new condos — and any accompanying ugly structures — might be right outside their doors rather than outside a rental building.

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Learn all the basics of NYC co-op and condo management, with straight talk from heavy hitters in the field of co-op or condo apartments

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