- Year built
- 1924
- Type
- Cooperative
- Landmark
- Designated
1019 Lexington Avenue is one of the prewar cooperatives that make the East 73rd Street blocks of Lenox Hill so consistently desirable. Built in 1924 — and, notably, organized as a cooperative house from the start rather than converted later — it occupies the corner of Lexington and 73rd, a quiet, low-rise stretch of brownstones, carriage houses, and small apartment buildings that ranks among the most intact prewar streetscapes on the East Side. The building is part of a coordinated wave of 1920s cooperative development along this block, neighboring the work of architects like Cross & Cross and James E. R. Carpenter on the adjacent 73rd Street addresses.
Its appeal is straightforward: a boutique prewar building of 24 apartments across 11 stories, on a protected historic-district block, two blocks from the Lexington Avenue express and a short walk from Central Park, the Frick, and the Madison Avenue retail corridor. For buyers who want a genuine prewar home with the proportions, light, and quiet that the era's cooperatives deliver — without the scale or scrutiny of a Park Avenue giant — it is exactly the kind of building that holds value across cycles.
Architecture and unit composition
The building belongs to the restrained, masonry-led prewar vocabulary of mid-1920s Lexington Avenue: a solid brick-and-stone elevation, ordered windows, and ground-floor commercial frontage on the avenue with residential entry calibrated to the corner. The architecture is dignified rather than showy — the point of these buildings was always the apartments inside.
With 24 residences across 11 floors, the homes are the classic prewar product of the period: gracious foyers, separate dining rooms, high ceilings, hardwood floors, and the kind of room-by-room circulation that distinguishes 1920s construction from anything built since. The boutique unit count keeps the building intimate and the common areas calm. Layouts and proportions vary by line and floor, so condition and exposure drive value as much as raw room count.
Building operations
1019 Lexington runs as a full-service prewar cooperative: an attended lobby, a live-in superintendent who knows the building, central laundry, and storage. The scale — two dozen owners — makes for a close, financially conscious cooperative with a board that screens carefully, as is standard for a prewar house of this type. Buyers should plan for a traditional board application and interview and for the conservative financing and ownership-use expectations customary at established Upper East Side cooperatives. We review the building's current policies on financing, subletting, pets, and pied-à-terre use with clients before an offer goes in.
Local Law 97
- 2024–2029 annual penalty
- $0 (under cap)
- 2030–2034 annual penalty
- $34,411/yr
- Per unit / month range
- $0 – $119
Facade safety — Local Law 11
Safe to live in today — but the last inspection flagged repairs that are due on a deadline, so facade work and its cost are coming. Whether that’s a real concern depends on the scope, the timing, and how the building plans to pay for it — reserves or an assessment — which is exactly what we’d dig into for you.
QEWI = Qualified Exterior Wall Inspector — the licensed engineer the city requires to sign the report (the independent expert, not the managing agent). Source: NYC DOB facade filings (FISP) · The Roebling Research Library.
See the full facade history →Recent sales
With 24 apartments and the long ownership tenures typical of a prewar cooperative, turnover at 1019 Lexington is modest — generally a small number of closings in an active year. Pricing tracks the broader Lenox Hill prewar market: renovated classic layouts with intact prewar detail command the building's top results, while homes that want updating offer the value entry. Because the building is small, each sale carries weight in setting the next; we track every closing here against the surrounding 73rd Street and Lexington Avenue cooperative stock. Specific figures depend on line, floor, and condition.
What to know if you’re buying
This is a classic prewar buy: purchase for the layout, the light, and the block. Confirm the line and exposure of any apartment under consideration, since proportions differ across the building, and weigh renovation scope against the home's existing prewar detail — preserving it is usually the value-maximizing path. Expect a traditional board process and structure financing conservatively. The historic-district setting protects the streetscape around you, which is part of the long-term appeal. We help clients build a clean board package and read the building's financials before committing.
What to know if you’re selling
Lead with the prewar layout and the location. A 1924 cooperative on a protected Lenox Hill block, two blocks from the express and walking distance to the park and Madison Avenue, is an easy story to tell — the work is matching the right buyer to the right home. Restoration-sensitive renovations that keep the prewar proportions while modernizing kitchens and baths achieve the strongest outcomes. Price against the surrounding boutique prewar cooperatives rather than larger postwar product, and set buyer expectations on the board process and financing posture early so the path to closing is clear.
Comparable buildings
If you're weighing 1019 Lexington Avenue, also consider nearby Lenox Hill prewar inventory:
- 1004 Lexington Avenue — prewar Lexington Avenue cooperative nearby
- 1091 Lexington Avenue — boutique prewar cooperative to the north
- 975 Lexington Avenue — prewar Lexington Avenue cooperative peer
- 976 Lexington Avenue — full-service Lexington Avenue cooperative nearby
The Roebling Team at 1019 Lexington Avenue
The Roebling Team at Compass specializes in the Upper East Side, Lenox Hill, Madison and Fifth Avenue, and the prewar cooperative market that defines them. We publish this profile because buyers and sellers in boutique prewar buildings deserve building-specific intelligence — the layouts, the block, the board, and where the pricing sits against the surrounding stock.
If you're considering a purchase or sale at 1019 Lexington Avenue, a 30-minute consultation is the right starting point.
Get the full picture on this building.
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