106 Spring Street

The building is a corner store-and-loft of the type that gives the SoHo–Cast Iron Historic District its texture: a masonry building rather than a cast-iron front, with a limestone base, brick and terra-cotta upper stories, large window openings on two street frontages, and open floor plates originally designed for light manufacturing. It stands six stories on a lot of roughly 5,380 square feet, with about 32,100 gross square feet in total — approximately 26,700 residential and 5,350 commercial.

Residential floors are divided north and south, and the transfer record reads accordingly: 2S, 3N, 3S, 4N, 5N, 5S, 6N. Half-floor plates in a corner building of this footprint produce apartments in the range of roughly 2,000 to 2,800 gross square feet — wide rather than deep, with the column grid, plaster-and-timber structure and ceiling heights that make loft space work. Listing records describe ceiling heights between eleven and fourteen feet, original cast-iron columns retained in several apartments, and oversized wood-framed windows. The corner position is the building's real advantage: south and west exposures on the Spring and Mercer frontages give light on two sides at a mid-block density where most SoHo lofts get one.

This is a small, quietly run cooperative rather than a full-service building. The capital record visible in city filings is steady: a boiler and burner replacement in 2008, water filtration and booster pumps in 2003, sidewalk-vault steel reinforcement in 2008, façade and parapet brickwork with a sidewalk shed and hoist in 2013–2015, bulkhead reconstruction in 2015, roof replacement in 2016, a fuel storage tank replacement in 2019, an ADA-compliant steel ramp and stair assembly at the entrance approved in 2021 and amended in 2022, and minor sidewalk-vault repair permitted in 2025.

Because the building is landmarked, exterior work runs through the Landmarks Preservation Commission. The permit record shows certificates of no effect for interior alterations, a new window opening at a secondary façade in 2018, exterior standpipe and Siamese-connection work in 2019, the entrance ramp in 2021–2022, and sidewalk replacement in 2024. Any buyer planning window replacement or exterior alteration should budget the Commission's process and the co-op board's own approval on top of the Department of Buildings filing.

The certificate-of-occupancy history deserves a line of its own. The 2002 alteration that reclassified the cellar and first floor as Use Group 6 retail did not produce a final certificate until September 2017, after fifteen consecutive temporary certificates. That is a long tail, and it is the kind of thing a buyer's attorney should ask about directly rather than assume was routine.

Nothing in this cooperative's policy stack is published, and we will not guess at it. No offering plan, proprietary lease, house rules or audited financial statement for Workspace, Inc. was located in either the Compass Offering Plan Library or The Roebling Research Library. The following are the questions to put to the managing agent in writing, and the answers should be in hand before an offer rather than after:

Financing ceiling and minimum down. SoHo loft co-ops of this vintage commonly cap financing well below the conventional eighty percent, and some prohibit financing entirely. Establish the maximum permitted loan-to-value before you set a price, because it determines your buyer pool as much as your own capacity.

Post-closing liquidity. Small boards frequently require liquid assets equal to one to three years of maintenance after closing, on top of the down payment. This requirement, not income, is what most often disqualifies an otherwise strong buyer.

Board package and interview. Assume full financial disclosure, personal and professional references, and an interview with the board. Budget four to eight weeks from signed contract to board approval, and understand that a co-op board may decline without giving a reason.

Sublet policy. Whether subletting is permitted at all, after what period of ownership, for what maximum term, at what fee, and whether approval is discretionary.

Flip tax. Whether one exists, whether it is calculated on gross price, on profit, or per share, and whether it is payable by seller or buyer.

Pied-à-terre, trust and LLC ownership. Most small co-ops require occupancy as a primary residence and refuse entity purchasers outright; some permit a trust with the beneficiary as occupant and a personal guarantee. Recorded transfers here include conveyances into revocable trusts, which suggests the board has permitted trust ownership at least in some form — but a recorded deed is not a policy, and the corporation's written position is what matters.

JLWQA compliance. Whether the certificate of occupancy still designates the units as joint living-working quarters for artists, whether the corporation requires or has ever required Department of Cultural Affairs artist certification, and what position the board takes today.

The corporation's full balance sheet — both buildings. Audited financial statements for Workspace, Inc., the underlying mortgage balance and maturity, the reserve position, any assessment in force or contemplated, and which commercial interests the corporation still owns after the April 2016 conveyance of the 106 Spring ground-floor space.

Recent sales

Recent transfers 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.

Market read. Most recent trades (2025) cleared a median $1,536/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 4.7% from the last ask — a recurring negotiation gap worth pricing into any offer or listing strategy.

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-00485-0021) 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 on co-ops is not officially recorded, figures shown are approximate.

You are buying shares, not real property. Your closing conveys a stock certificate and a proprietary lease. Your lender takes a security interest in shares rather than a mortgage on real estate, which means a smaller pool of lenders, a recognition agreement with the corporation, and different closing costs — no mortgage recording tax and no title insurance in the ordinary sense.

Underwrite the corporation, not the address. Workspace, Inc. owns 106 Spring Street and 91–93 Mercer Street. Ask for financials, the underlying mortgage and the reserve position at the corporation level, and understand how the two buildings' capital needs are shared.

Resolve the JLWQA question first. Ask for the current certificate of occupancy. Ask whether the corporation has ever required artist certification. If the answers are unsatisfactory, that is a reason to walk, not a detail to paper over.

Ask what the corporation still owns commercially. The ground-floor retail interest at 106 Spring left the corporation in April 2016. In a house of this size, commercial income — or its absence — moves maintenance more than any other single line.

Price the landmark overhead. Windows, façade, storefront and anything visible from the street runs through the Landmarks Preservation Commission. That is time and money on your renovation and on the corporation's capital work alike.

Read the certificate-of-occupancy file. Fifteen temporary certificates preceded the 2017 final. Have counsel confirm there is nothing outstanding behind that history.

Lead with the corner and the plate. Half-floor lofts with two exposures on a landmarked SoHo corner are the product. Very little of that inventory remains and none of it is being built.

Assemble the documents before you list. The absence of a published policy stack cuts against a seller — buyers' attorneys stall on unanswered questions. Have the proprietary lease, house rules, the last two audited financial statements and the current certificate of occupancy ready before the first offer.

Qualify buyers at the showing. In a small co-op the deal most often dies at the board, not at the appraisal. Knowing the financing ceiling, the liquidity requirement and the interview standard lets your broker screen at the door.

Address the JLWQ certificate proactively. Buyers' counsel will raise it. A seller who already holds the corporation's written position converts a scare into a footnote.

If you're considering 106 Spring Street, also evaluate:

• 93 Mercer Street — the other building owned by the same cooperative corporation, ten half-floor lofts on the adjoining lot; the closest possible comparison
• 45 Crosby Street — twelve residences plus a commercial space in an 1895 building, also carried as class D0; the nearest peer as a small SoHo loft cooperative
• 477 Broome Street — twenty-residence owner-occupied cooperative in an 1870s cast-iron loft; the larger co-op alternative
• 465 West Broadway — twenty-four residences converted to cooperative in 1985; the west-side SoHo co-op comparison
• 131 Thompson Street — turn-of-the-century cooperative on SoHo's western edge; the value-tier co-op alternative
• 77 Mercer Street — ten residential lofts, two per floor, in an 1876 cast-iron building on the same street; the condominium alternative
• 43 Wooster Street — ten residences stacked two per floor in an 1885 store-and-loft inside the same historic district, in condominium form
• 22 Mercer Street — sixteen-residence condominium conversion of a mid-nineteenth-century loft; deeded ownership, same street
• 57 Greene Street — 1877 masonry warehouse converted to a fifteen-unit condominium in 2016; the newer-conversion comparison
• 105 Wooster Street — fifteen-residence loft condominium; boutique scale, condominium policy framework