1 Grand Army Plaza (Richard Meier on Prospect Park)
1 Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn, NY 11238
Prospect Heights, Brooklyn
BBL 3011727502 · BIN 3395389
- Year built
- 2006
- Type
- Condominium
- Units
- 94
- Floors
- 15
- Landmark
- No
- Subletting
- Condominium form. The offering plan states expressly that the condominium board does NOT have the right to approve or disapprove purchasers and imposes no limit on investor ownership; a unit owner must offer the Board of Managers a right of first refusal on the same terms, but an owner of an Unsold Unit is not required to. Current minimum lease term unverified.
Compiled by The Roebling Research Desk from the building’s offering plan, amendments, and related building documents (primary source dated 2006 plan as filed). Reported and subject to confirmation. Board policies can change by amendment — confirm at the offer stage.
Every recorded sale at this building, 2008–2026
Price-per-square-foot over time, the line- and floor-premium curves, and every recorded sale.
- Median $/sf
- $1,489
- Listing discount
- 3.3%
- Recorded sales
- 176
- On record
- 2008–2026
Own an apartment here? See what it would sell for.
A Private Pricing Opinion — what your apartment at Richard Meier on Prospect Park would likely sell for today, what it costs to sell, and what you’d walk away with — reviewed personally against condition, exposures, renovation quality, and the competition actually on the market.
There is exactly one Richard Meier building in Brooklyn, and it is standing on the most ceremonial piece of ground in the borough. Grand Army Plaza is Olmsted and Vaux's northern gateway to Prospect Park, and its ring is otherwise a collection of 1920s brick apartment houses on Plaza Street, the McKim, Mead & White arch, and Francis Keally's 1941 library. Into that composition, in the mid-2000s, went a white steel-and-glass slab designed by the architect of the Getty Center. The AIA Guide to New York City dismissed it as "a massive beached whale." The building has never stopped being an argument, and for a certain buyer that is precisely the appeal: total transparency, floor-to-ceiling glass on the park side, and a view down the Long Meadow that no other for-sale building in Prospect Heights can offer.
The site itself explains a great deal about how the building works. The land came from the Union Temple of Brooklyn, the religious corporation at 17 Eastern Parkway whose synagogue, daycare and playground share the property line. As part of the acquisition, the sponsor and the Temple recorded a Declaration of Covenants, Restrictions and Easements dated April 25, 2005, and that document still governs a surprising amount of daily life at 1 Grand Army Plaza. It created a separate Temple Unit of roughly 2,140 square feet within the condominium, conveyed to the Temple rather than sold. It reserved 55 of the garage's parking spaces for the Temple's use. It preserved the long-term lease of the Eastern Athletic Club, which dates to 1985, and gave residents interior access to the club through the Temple Unit. It carried construction restrictions for the Sabbath and holidays. A buyer at 1 Grand Army Plaza is buying into a genuinely unusual arrangement: a modernist condominium tower structurally interlocked with a synagogue and a health club, with the terms recorded and enforceable.
The unit count tells the story of the sellout. The plan accepted for filing on September 8, 2006 offered 114 residential units at a total of roughly $204 million. What actually got built and declared is a 94-residence building, because units were combined into larger homes as the market for the project developed. That is a favorable outcome for a resale buyer today — the surviving inventory is bigger and better-proportioned than the original schedule contemplated — but it means the plan's Schedule A is not a map of the building as it stands. Ask for the current declaration.
The condominium began operations on December 23, 2008, at the bottom of the cycle, and its early years show it. The board bought the superintendent's unit from the sponsor in October 2010 and still carries a mortgage against it. In February 2014 it took a ten-year, $2 million commercial loan to fund a roof and balcony waterproofing project — the single most consequential capital item in a building of this envelope. It litigated its sponsor over repair responsibility, won a partial judgment on liability in 2019, and settled all claims confidentially in mediation in 2021. In December 2020 it applied for a $2.5 million line of credit for capital projects, approved in March 2021. The sponsor sold its last residential unit in February 2020 and, as of the most recent audited statements reviewed here, retained only the garage unit.
None of that is disqualifying, and most of it is ordinary for a 2008-vintage glass building. It is, however, the actual operating history, and it is the part of this building that a marketing photograph will never show you.
Architecture and unit composition
The building rises fifteen stories over a sub-cellar and cellar, with a setback above the eighth floor that steps the mass back from Plaza Street East and produces the terraced upper tier. The elevation is Meier's signature vocabulary applied at Brooklyn scale: white metal panel, clear glass, projecting horizontal balcony slabs, and a rigorously flat, unornamented plane. The main residential entrance faces Plaza Street East and the arch; the garage entrance is on St. John's Place; the health club entrance is on Eastern Parkway through the Temple Unit.
Interiors follow from the exterior. Floor-to-ceiling glazing is the organizing move, and the west and south exposures — over Grand Army Plaza and toward Prospect Park — are the ones the building was designed around. North and east units look toward St. John's Place and Underhill Avenue and price accordingly. Most residences have private balconies. Cellar storage units were allocated to unit owners under the plan.
Two practical consequences follow from a curtain-wall building of this type, and both belong in a buyer's underwriting. The first is thermal and acoustic performance: full-height glass is spectacular and it is not free, and energy and comfort should be evaluated on the specific exposure rather than in the abstract. The second is the balcony-and-roof waterproofing question, which this condominium has already addressed once with borrowed money. Ask what was done in 2014, what has been done since, and what the current envelope condition report says.
The white-backing rule for window treatments deserves particular mention because it surprises buyers. It is written into the offering plan as part of the building's design scheme rather than left to the house rules, and every opening was built to receive concealed ceiling-recessed roller shades. Plan your window treatments accordingly.
Building operations
The condominium is a full-service building with an attended lobby, a resident superintendent housed in a unit the condominium itself owns, and an amenity structure that is unusual because part of it sits outside the building. The Eastern Athletic Club arrangement is the clearest example: residents have interior access through the Temple Unit, and the condominium carries a sports club membership expense at the building level that has moved substantially year to year. Confirm what the current agreement provides, what it costs the budget, and whether it is guaranteed for any term.
The operating budget also carries a line for the building's art program — a small, genuinely distinctive expense for a residential condominium, and a reflection of how the building has run itself.
The capital picture is legible and should be read in full. The 2014 waterproofing loan, the superintendent's-unit mortgage refinanced in 2015, and the 2021 line of credit are all documented in the audited statements, as is the fact that the condominium has not commissioned a reserve study or adopted a funding plan for future major repairs — a disclosure the auditors repeat and one a buyer should take seriously in a building with this much glass. The Roebling Research Library maintains the financial file and shares it with clients during diligence; confirm the current agent, reserve position and assessment history with management.
Policy framework
Purchaser approval: None. The offering plan states that the condominium board has no right to approve or disapprove purchasers and imposes no cap on investor ownership. Transfers run through the customary right of first refusal, and a holder of unsold units is not obliged to offer it.
Use: Residential. Changing a unit's certificate of occupancy for non-residential use requires board approval, and the plan provides that the board may unreasonably refuse.
Window treatments: All window treatments must have a white backing so that only white is visible from the exterior; openings were constructed to accept concealed roller shades.
Storage and parking: Cellar storage was allocated to unit owners under the plan. Garage spaces are rented, not owned, and the garage unit is a separate condominium unit; 98 of approximately 153 spaces are available to residents on a first-come basis, with 55 reserved for the Temple Unit.
Reserve fund: The offering plan provided no reserve fund, on the theory that a new building's major components would live out their expected lives. The audited statements confirm that no reserve study has been performed and no funding plan adopted. This is a real underwriting fact.
Property taxes: The sponsor filed for 421-a benefits and disclosed that they might not be in place at first closing. No phase-out year is asserted here. Verify the current bill on the specific unit.
Pets, subletting terms, minimum financing, flip tax: Not publicly documented in the records reviewed; confirm the current by-laws and house rules in writing.
Local Law 97
- 2024–2029 annual penalty
- $0 (under cap)
- 2030–2034 annual penalty
- $69,730/yr
- Per unit / month range
- $0 – $62
Source: NYC LL84 benchmarking and PLUTO · The Roebling Research Library. City record last verified September 2026.
See full Local Law 97 analysis — emissions history, scenarios, methodology →Facade safety — Local Law 11
The latest available FISP filing classified the facade as Safe — no repairs were required at that inspection. Facade inspections run on a fixed five-year cycle; future inspection, repair, and any assessment decisions remain building-specific.
How to read this, and where it comes from
QEWI = Qualified Exterior Wall Inspector — the licensed engineer the city requires to sign the report (the independent expert, not the managing agent).
Penalties shown are amounts DOB assessed against filings on record across 2015–20 to 2020–25. The FISP dataset does not record whether they were paid, contested or remain open, so treat the figure as history rather than a current balance and confirm the building’s standing with the managing agent.
Source: NYC DOB facade filings (FISP) · The Roebling Research Library. City record last verified September 2026.
421-a Tax Abatement
- Last year of benefit
- FY2035
- Years remaining
- ~10 yrs
- Program
- 421-a (25-year)
A long-dated tax benefit still in place — a meaningful carrying-cost advantage today. Note the eventual step-up toward full taxes when the abatement ends.
Source: NYC Dept. of Finance property-tax exemption records (421-a), refreshed 2026-09-06 · The Roebling Research Library. Confirm the exact step-up schedule on the building’s DOF tax bill. Years shown are NYC tax years, which start July 1 — FY2036 runs July 1, 2035 to June 30, 2036.
Recent sales
Recent closings at this building, curated by The Roebling Team research desk. Prices are the transfer amounts recorded with the NYC Department of Finance; apartment-level detail is checked against the building’s own file in The Roebling Research Library before publishing.
| Date | Unit | Apartment | Price | PPSF | vs. Ask |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 27, 2026 | 7F | 1 BR · 1 BA · 1,091 sf | $2,010,000 | $1,842/sf | +0.8% |
| Feb 18, 2026 | 7A | 1 BR · 1,043 sf | $1,500,000 | $1,438/sf | off-mkt |
| Feb 2, 2026 | 4C | 1 BR · 2 BA · 1,195 sf | $1,720,000 | $1,439/sf | -4.4% |
| Nov 12, 2025 | 4F | 4 BR · 3 BA · 3,199 sf | $4,800,000 | $1,500/sf | -16.9% |
| Sep 29, 2025 | 3C | 2 BR · 2 BA · 1,227 sf | $1,999,999 | $1,630/sf | +0.3% |
| Sep 26, 2025 | 2D | 3 BR · 2 BA · 1,526 sf | $2,175,000 | $1,425/sf | -9.2% |
| Apr 30, 2025 | 11E | 3 BR · 2 BA · 1,825 sf | $3,805,000 | $2,085/sf | +4.2% |
| Mar 4, 2025 | 5C | 1 BR · 2 BA · 1,076 sf | $1,755,000 | $1,631/sf | +0.3% |
Market read. Most recent trades (2026) cleared a median $1,489/sf across 3 sales. Median listing discount 3.3% from the last ask — a recurring negotiation gap worth pricing into any offer or listing strategy.
The retrade record
Lines that have traded more than once in the public record — the building’s appreciation arc, apartment by apartment.
Full closing history with price-per-square-foot over time, the complete retrade record, and every line that has traded.
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-01172-7502) and verified listing data. Apartment-level facts (line, condition, asking-price context) curated and cross-verified by The Roebling Team research desk. Not all transactions cross-verify with ACRIS records — sponsor and LLC purchases sometimes record at stipulated values rather than market price; square footage from recorded condo declarations and offering plans.
What to know if you’re buying
The view is the asset, and it is exposure-specific. Buy the Prospect Park and Grand Army Plaza side if that is what you came for. The difference between exposures here is larger than the difference between floors.
Read the DCR&E. The Union Temple easement package — the Temple Unit, the 55 reserved parking spaces, the health club access and non-competition terms, the Sabbath and holiday construction restrictions — is recorded, enforceable, and permanent. It is a genuinely interesting arrangement and it should be read, not skimmed.
Underwrite the envelope. A 2008 curtain-wall building that borrowed $2 million in 2014 to waterproof its roof and balconies has a documented envelope history. Ask for the current condition report, the post-2014 work, and the status of the line of credit.
There is no reserve study. The auditors say so plainly. Assessment risk in a building of this construction type is a live question, and the reserve position should be checked in the current year's statement, not a historical one.
Do not assume 421-a is still helping you. The plan filed for it; nothing here asserts what remains. Pull the specific unit's tax bill and run true monthly carrying cost.
The health club is an arrangement, not a fixture. Confirm the current terms before you value it.
What to know if you’re selling
Lead with the architect and the address. The only Richard Meier building in Brooklyn, on Grand Army Plaza, facing the arch. That sentence does more work than any amenity list, and it is factually unimpeachable.
Photograph the glass and the park. The building's argument is transparency and outlook. Interiors shot without the view undersell it badly.
Get ahead of the capital story. Waterproofing, litigation, settlement, line of credit — a buyer's attorney will assemble all of it. A seller who presents it first, with the current reserve position and assessment history attached, controls the narrative.
Separate your comparables carefully. Sponsor sales, early closings and resales are three different populations in this building's record. Price off recent arm's-length resales on comparable exposures.
Closings are condominium-fast. No board package, no purchaser approval, right of first refusal only. Market that: it is a real advantage over every prewar cooperative within a half-mile.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering Richard Meier on Prospect Park, also evaluate:
- 135 Eastern Parkway (Turner Towers) — the neighborhood's largest prewar cooperative, three blocks east; the tenure alternative
- 10 Plaza Street East — the largest of the Plaza Street cooperatives, on the opposite side of the circle
- 34 Plaza Street East — Plaza Street prewar co-op facing Grand Army Plaza; the direct prewar neighbor
- 41 Eastern Parkway — prewar co-op at the Grand Army Plaza end of the Parkway
- 1 Prospect Park West — condominium conversion at the Plaza's southwest corner; the closest tenure-and-location peer
- 550 Vanderbilt Avenue — the only condominium in Pacific Park; the newer full-service alternative in Prospect Heights
- 700 Pacific Street (Newswalk) — the neighborhood's large loft conversion, for buyers weighing volume against amenity
- 11 Hoyt Street — Downtown Brooklyn's amenity-tier condominium benchmark
- 50 Bridge Park Drive (Quay Tower) — Brooklyn Bridge Park's trophy condominium; the borough's park-view price ceiling
How to read the facts on this page. Items attributed to an offering plan describe the building as it was offered at that filing — unit mix, square footage, the amenity program as planned. They are not a statement about how the building operates today. Tax and compliance figures are sourced separately to current City records and carry their own dates. House rules, staffing and fee policy can change by board resolution without any public filing: treat every policy line here as a starting point for diligence and confirm it with the managing agent. Where this page compares one building or neighborhood to another, that is our analysis of the recorded record — it names the measure, the period and the sample it rests on, and it is an observation about medians rather than a prediction about any particular apartment.
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