Recent news affecting co-op / condo buyers, sellers, boards and residents. This week: When co-op / condo sales prices go down, property taxes still go up because market prices don't count in the computation. Now Albany says they should count — also to make property taxes go up. New York City Councilwoman Letitia James and others are trying to break this damned-if-you-do / damned-if-you-don't cycle.
Plus, while Co-op City's management fights a court order to accommodate a wheelchair resident, Co-op City's board votes to accommodate him. Maybe Co-op City needs new management — especially since manager RiverBay Corp. just got the place fined $85,000 over another disability denial. What do they have against disabled people, anyway? They cost too much? We've the latest on income-restrict apartments, how to stage for a sale and two sales records set, and how'd you like to do David Duchovny's co-op admissions interview?
The 48-unit high-rise HDFC co-op at 1715 Nelson Avenue in The Bronx has a new amenity to offer its residents: Nine custom-built steel storage units from Bargold Storage Systems. Under Bargold's rental plan, the company absorbs the full cost of installation (estimated at $3,000 per unit) and then rents out the units to tenants itself, sharing a 25 percent commission with the co-op.
... the Sheffield condominium's male prostitute is getting evicted, but not for, like, a month, and there's visiting-dog trouble at a Riverdale co-op. For co-op and condo boards, we have another case of going out of your way to make life hell for older residents, and an expert says a co-op board president can let his cousin sublet longer than other shareholders can.
February 19, 2012
... a Brooklyn co-op ponders the cost of repairs now that its building has been landmarked and a buyer gets blindsided by a seller not honoring a deal — wait till you read why. And a real-estate attorney explains how co-op boards may just have saved New York City real estate.