MIDTOWN

Many buildings end up in possession of a vacant unit when a rental occupant moves out. With rent-controlled or rent-stabilized apartments, this often happens only when the tenant dies. However, if conditions are right, the building could negotiate with a willing occupant to leave under sunnier conditions, leaving a cooperative or a condominium association with an apartment it can then sell. But those negotiations can be tricky. Rental regulations provide strong protections to a rent-controlled or rent-stabilized tenant, who will often want a sizable severance price, especially if the apartment is in a desirable neighborhood.

When a co-op board sells a unit that it's acquired by a rental apartment's vacancy, you must wear two hats: one as the seller and the other as the discerning board carefully reviewing a potential shareholder's financial dossier. Just because a board enters into a contract with a buyer doesn't mean the board has relinquished its right to reject the shareholder.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week, the Attorney General brings down the hammer on a real estate attorney we hope wasn't yours, Hell's Kitchen residents want a homeless woman to get the hell away, a family feuds over a Park Avenue co-op, and we've an update on that Florida condo where faith-based discrimination against unmarried straight and gay couples made national headlines. Plus, for condo and co-op boards, we've the latest on the City Council bill for regulating co-op admissions.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week, a wonderful new affordable co-op in The Bronx (at left) finds loud, trashy neighbors drinking on the street and throwing dangerous objects from several stories above — and the police don't care. Bet they would if this were 15 Central Park West, another co-op in the news. Plus, why is a Queens condo paying to keep up land the Department of Transportation is supposed to maintain? And for boards, we've the latest on the Dakota's discrimination lawsuit and on two East Village co-ops' no-restaurant policy.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week, Zeckendorf Towers goes smokeless, the folks at Alwyn Court and The Briarcliff go homeless, and thanks to 24-hour construction crews, a Rockaways co-op goes sleepless. Plus, three Lower East Side co-ops install fuel-efficient boilers to save money heating 2,700 apartments, Airbnb lobbies politicians to take the "illegal" out of illegal hoteling, and people debate the pros and cons of the proposed co-op admissions disclosure law.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. Lots of news for boards in particular this week, as one co-op board sues the developer of One57 — the condo with the crane — and other boards face lawsuits against them because of superstorm Sandy. And it's board member vs. board member at The Bronx's Brady Court. Plus, a third of all homebuyers don't know what an "annual percentage rate" is. And while we'd bet that Ben Stiller (at left) does, he and his actress wife Christine Taylor still lost a million selling their co-op duplex on the Upper West Side.

The 250-unit Normandy, located at 140 Riverside Drive on Manhattan's Upper West Side, recently phased out its old-style bulbs. For co-op board president Bennett Lincoff, convincing the other board members it was a good idea was easier than screwing in a light bulb. The fact is, according to energy experts and building managers, if you still have incandescent lighting in your building's public spaces, rather than compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) or light-emitting diodes (LEDs), you're probably wasting money.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. Yet another restaurant, yet another building fighting it: Like the planned Denny's in FiDi and a still-unnamed Mexican place in Tribeca, the Atlantic Terrace co-op in Brooklyn (left) wants to say arrivederci to Tony Roma's. Plus, a shareholder's riled in Riverdale and we remember the Rembrandt, New York City's first co-op. And co-op / condo boards won't want to miss the lawsuit alleging a scam of Weekend at Bernie's proportions!

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week, an Upper East Side co-op owner with pot-smoking friends wishes the board would just chill out, dude. Plus, a dearth of condos makes it harder to buy the one you want, the mighty Thor Equites vanquishes a condo board, and no-FEMA apartments.

Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week, Congress and the president save the mortgage-interest deduction, buildings in the flood zone, including co-ops and condos, may be required to buy flood insurance, Spielbergian producers sell their co-op and Manhattan apartment prices about to go up.