103 Montague Street
103 Montague Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
BBL 3002420012 · BIN 3001968
- Year built
- 1885
- Type
- Cooperative
- Units
- 25
- Floors
- 8
- Landmark
- Designated
103 Montague Street is one of the buildings that invented apartment living in Brooklyn. When the Parfitt Brothers finished it in 1886, the idea that respectable families would live stacked on top of one another was still novel enough to require salesmanship, and the salesmanship is legible in the plan: seven floors holding fourteen apartments, each with its own servants' apartment, an elevator, an attic party room, and every modern convenience the 1880s could install. This was the same argument 62 Montague Street made at the other end of the street in 1888 and that the Berkeley and the Grosvenor made a block west — Montague Street as Brooklyn's proving ground for the apartment house, at exactly the moment the Brooklyn Bridge had made the Heights commutable.
The Parfitt Brothers were the right firm for the job, and 103 Montague still carries their ornament: terra-cotta floral bands and, best of all, a carved grotesque leaning out over the sidewalk to watch the street below. The LPC files the building under "Eclectic-Romanesque"; the architectural history calls it Queen Anne. Both describe the same restless 1880s masonry, from the moment before those categories hardened.
The second chapter shaped the apartments a buyer sees today. In 1900 the developer Louis Horowitz bought the building and turned it into a residential hotel aimed at single gentlemen, subdividing the original large apartments and putting a restaurant on the ground floor for tenants. The painted Hotel Montague sign from that era is still faintly visible on the side wall — one of the Heights' better ghost signs — and the LPC's own records carry a still later hotel name, the Hotel Brookmont. A hundred and twenty-five years of subdivision, recombination and conversion sit between the Parfitts' fourteen apartments and today's twenty-five cooperative units, which is why no two apartments here are quite alike.
Today the building is Pinette Housing Corp., an eight-story, twenty-five-unit cooperative on the busiest retail block in Brooklyn Heights. It is not quiet and does not pretend to be. What it offers is what the Heights' side streets cannot: everything at the door — groceries, restaurants, Borough Hall and four subway lines within a few minutes' walk, and the Promenade four blocks west.
Architecture and unit composition
The building is eight stories of brick with terra-cotta trim, standing among the low commercial fabric of mid-Montague and rising well above it. The Parfitt ornament is the architectural signature, and the cooperative has looked after it: the 2016 alteration filing covered brick, stone and terra-cotta repair, sealant installation and painting across the façade — the specific and expensive maintenance that a decorative masonry envelope of this age requires and that many Heights buildings defer.
The apartments reflect the building's three lives. What began as fourteen large apartments with servants' quarters became a residential hotel's smaller rooms after 1900, and then became cooperative apartments; the count has continued to move in the modern era, with alteration filings recording twenty-eight dwelling units through 2011 and twenty-five from 2016 forward. In practical terms this means the building holds a genuinely varied inventory — small units created by the hotel era, larger units created by combining them back — and that line-to-line comparison is close to meaningless here. The variables that set price are the specific apartment's size, exposure, ceiling condition and renovation state. South-facing units front the Montague Street retail corridor; north-facing units look toward the Pierrepont Street block behind, which is quieter. Any purchase should include a careful look at the certificate of occupancy and the share allocation for the specific unit.
Building operations
Pinette Housing Corp. has run the building as a cooperative for decades, on the model that fits a twenty-five-unit prewar elevator building on a commercial block: an elevator, a superintendent-scale service posture, and a board that has to plan capital work around a decorative masonry façade in a historic district. No managing agent is publicly documented; current management should be confirmed with the cooperative, and The Roebling Team remains the contact of record for clients.
The capital record is the useful part of the diligence picture: roofing and façade repairs in 2004, sidewalk shed and pipe scaffold for remedial repairs in 2004 and 2005, and a full façade campaign in 2016 covering brick, stone and terra-cotta repair with sealant and painting. For an 1886 masonry building that is an active rather than a deferred maintenance history — ask the board where the current Local Law 11 cycle stands and what the reserve holds against the next one. Where a cooperative on this block holds ground-floor retail space, the rent roll is part of the financial picture and should be read alongside the maintenance schedule.
Recent sales
The retrade record
Lines that have traded more than once in the public record — the building’s appreciation arc, apartment by apartment.
Recent transfers at this building, sourced from NYC Department of Finance records. Apartment-level detail (line, condition, asking-price context) verified upon consultation request.
| Date | Unit | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Apr 8, 2024 | 404 | $1,325,000 |
| Feb 13, 2024 | 602 | $1,135,000 |
| Nov 29, 2023 | 604 | $1,325,000 |
| Sep 8, 2023 | 202 | $1,175,000 |
| Aug 10, 2023 | 703 | $1,405,000 |
| Jun 2, 2023 | 802 | $1,595,000 |
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-00242-0012) 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.
What to know if you’re buying
Every apartment here is its own case. Fourteen original apartments, a hotel-era subdivision and decades of combinations make the inventory genuinely heterogeneous. Judge the specific unit — size, ceilings, light, condition — and ignore building averages.
Confirm the share ledger and the certificate of occupancy. Filings record twenty-eight dwelling units through 2011 and twenty-five from 2016.
Read the façade history as a positive. The 2016 brick, stone and terra-cotta campaign is exactly the work an 1886 ornamented masonry building needs. Ask where the Local Law 11 cycle stands and what the reserve holds.
Price the block, not just the building. Montague Street is the Heights' retail corridor: convenient, lively, and audibly so on lower floors and south exposures. Visit on a Friday evening.
Ask for policy in writing. Sublet rules, pets, pied-à-terre use, financing limits and any flip tax are not publicly documented; the board's current answers control.
What to know if you’re selling
Name the architects and the ghost sign. Parfitt Brothers, the Montague Apartments, the Hotel Montague sign on the side wall, the grotesque over the sidewalk — most Heights co-ops of this size have no documented pedigree at all.
Lead with convenience. The buyer here wants to live on top of the neighborhood rather than beside it. Market the walk, the four subway lines, and the Promenade four blocks west.
Document the capital work. The 2016 façade campaign and the 2004–05 remedial repairs evidence a board that maintains a difficult envelope.
Price per room against the district's mid-size prewar set — Montague-corridor and adjacent-block prewars of similar scale, not the full-service Cadman Plaza buildings.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 103 Montague Street, also evaluate:
- 62 Montague Street (The Arlington) — Montrose W. Morris's 1888 apartment house at the Promenade end; the closest historical peer on the street
- 65 Montague Street — 1934 elevator co-op at the quiet west end of Montague
- 66 Montague Street — small Montague Street cooperative; the boutique alternative
- 166 Montague Street (The Franklin Trust Company Building) — the street's landmark bank-to-condominium conversion; the condominium alternative on the same corridor
- 57 Montague Street (The Breukelen) — larger full-service cooperative a few doors west
- 108 Pierrepont Street — prewar co-op on the block immediately north
- 123 Pierrepont Street — small prewar cooperative on the parallel corridor
- 153 Henry Street — prewar elevator co-op a short walk south
- 35 Pierrepont Street — prewar cooperative peer of comparable scale
The full playbook — what goes in the package, how boards read your financials, the interview, and the timeline — plus sample cover, reference, and personal letters you can adapt.
Considering a move at Built as The Montague Apartments; operated for most of the twentieth century as the Hotel Montague, whose faded painted sign survives on the side wall. The LPC's district records carry a later hotel name, Hotel Brookmont?
Request a private building brief with the relevant comparable sales, current and off-market availability, and an apartment-specific view of value.
Own an apartment here? See what it would sell for.
A Private Pricing Opinion — what your apartment at Built as The Montague Apartments; operated for most of the twentieth century as the Hotel Montague, whose faded painted sign survives on the side wall. The LPC's district records carry a later hotel name, Hotel Brookmont 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.