115 Willow Street
115 Willow Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
BBL 3002350028 · BIN 3001791
- Year built
- 1926
- Type
- Cooperative
- Units
- 39
- Floors
- 6
- Landmark
- Designated
- Flip tax
- Not documented in the materials reviewed; confirm at offer stage
- Financing
- 25% minimum down reported in recent coverage (Brownstoner listing coverage) — hedged on page as 'reported, confirm'
- Subletting
- Governed by proprietary lease with board oversight; house rules bind subtenants; current policy to be confirmed
- Pets
- Domesticated pets only, subject to board approval; privileges revocable on written notice (house rules adopted May 2010)
Compiled by The Roebling Research Desk from the building’s offering plan, amendments, and related building documents (primary source dated 2010). Reported and subject to confirmation. Board policies can change by amendment — confirm at the offer stage.
115 Willow Street is the building the tenants bought for themselves. When the owner of the six-story Gothic apartment house between Clark and Pierrepont put the property in play at the start of the 1980s conversion wave, the residents did not wait for a sponsor's terms: the 115 Willow Street Tenants Association — representing more than 60 percent of the building — raised its own down payment under a Department of Law exemption, took assignment of the October 30, 1980 offering plan, and contracted to buy the building for $1,635,000, closing in 1983. The amended plan allocated 10,000 shares across 38 apartments and offered insiders their homes at $150 per share against an outsider price of $368.60 — the arithmetic of a tenant-led deal, with the discount flowing to the people who organized it. Co-ops converted this way tend to keep the culture that created them, and four decades of stable, owner-first governance at 115 Willow bear that out.
The building the tenants fought for is one of the district's quiet architectural surprises. Slee & Bryson — the Brooklyn firm whose Colonial Revival row houses define Albemarle Terrace and much of brownstone Brooklyn's early-twentieth-century infill — worked here in Gothic dress: pointed-arch window surrounds, multi-paned glazing, a castellated parapet, and chimneys that give the roofline a storybook profile. When it opened in 1927 with 32 apartments, the marketing promised the Jazz Age essentials — elevator service and electric refrigeration in suites of about four rooms — and the building has carried high ceilings, wood floors, and picture rails through to the present. On a block of Federal and Greek Revival row houses two blocks from the Promenade, the Gothic apartment house reads as ornament rather than intrusion, which is precisely why the LPC's first-in-the-city historic district folded it in without controversy in 1965.
Today the building operates as a characteristic Willow Street small co-op with a service level unusual for its size: a part-time doorman on evening coverage, a live-in superintendent, central laundry, bike storage, and a shared backyard garden with the block's interior quiet. Units now number 39 by the city's count — subdivision and combination have moved the figure around the original 32 and the plan's 38 — and the inventory runs from one-bedrooms through combined spreads, priced per room in the district's prewar mid-tier.
For buyers, the proposition is the block itself plus the building's temperament: Willow Street address, district-core quiet, real services at small-co-op maintenance, and a shareholder culture descended directly from the tenants who bought the building.
Architecture and unit composition
The 39 units distribute across six floors around a single elevator core, in configurations from one-bedrooms — many descending from the original four-room suites — through combinations assembled over the decades. Period fabric is the pricing axis: high ceilings, wood floors, picture rails, and the Gothic fenestration read strongest in units that have been renovated with rather than against them. Willow-facing units take the row-house streetscape and western light toward the Promenade blocks; rear units face the garden side and the interior of the block shared with the Hicks Street co-ops, and are the building's quietest tier.
Construction is 1920s masonry with fire escapes, and the LPC layer applies to windows and any façade-adjacent work — routine in the district, but a step renovating buyers should schedule for. Alterations run through the managing agent's alteration agreement with board approval; contractor hours are weekday-limited under the house rules.
Building operations
115 Willow runs as a serviced small cooperative under 115 Willow Street Corporation: evening doorman coverage, a live-in superintendent, central laundry, and the shared garden, with professional management administering access, alteration, and sale procedures. The house rules — adopted in their current form in 2010 — are practical rather than punitive: a 70 percent carpet rule, quiet hours from 11 p.m. to 8 a.m., garden hours of 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., board-approved and revocable pet privileges, and notification requirements for sales and open houses. Smoking is prohibited in all interior and exterior common spaces.
The offering plan and first amendment, house rules, and a multi-year run of the corporation's financial statements are maintained in The Roebling Research Library and shared with clients during diligence.
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 31, 2025 | 6D | $1,282,500 |
| May 22, 2025 | 2D | $1,150,000 |
| Apr 28, 2025 | 5A | $2,880,000 |
| Aug 1, 2024 | 6F | $910,000 |
| Jun 18, 2024 | 5CD | $2,200,000 |
| Mar 6, 2024 | 1EF | $2,250,000 |
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-00235-0028) 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
The block is the asset; the building is the value route in. Willow between Clark and Pierrepont is row-house Brooklyn Heights at its most intact, and this is one of the few ways to own on it at apartment pricing. Judge value against the block's scarcity, not just the unit's square footage.
Buy the period fabric where it survives. Gothic windows, high ceilings, and picture rails are the building's currency; a unit that keeps them outperforms a stripped renovation of equal size over any holding period.
Take the documented rules seriously. Pet approval is board-granted and revocable, carpet coverage is enforced, and financing has been reported at 25 percent minimum down. None of it is unusual for the district; all of it belongs in your offer planning.
Expect a tenant-descended board culture. The co-op was created by its own residents and governs like it — owner-first, detail-attentive, and stable. Complete, well-prepared board packages land well here.
What to know if you’re selling
Tell the conversion story. A building its tenants organized to buy in 1983 is a documented provenance that signals exactly the stability co-op buyers and their attorneys want; it belongs in the narrative alongside the architecture.
Photograph the Gothic. Window surrounds, parapet, and chimneys distinguish this building from every generic prewar comparable; exterior and detail photography earn their space in the marketing file.
Anchor per-room pricing to configuration and condition. The spread between period-intact, renovated, and combined units is the real pricing axis; the building's own line history — not neighborhood averages — makes the case.
Flag the process practicalities early. Superintendent and board notice before listing and showings is a house rule; building it into the marketing timeline avoids friction with the neighbors who will vote on your buyer.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 115 Willow Street, also evaluate:
- 128 Willow Street — prewar co-op neighbor across the street
- 149 Willow Street — small co-op peer a block north on Willow
- 135 Willow Street — the postwar services alternative with garage on the same street
- The Mansion House (145 Hicks Street) — the 1935 doorman co-op sharing the block; the services step-up
- 130 Hicks Street — the postwar entry-tier co-op back-to-back on the same block interior
- 70 Clark Street — prewar elevator co-op by the Clark Street station
- 72 Orange Street — 1937 prewar co-op on the fruit streets; the sibling character play two blocks north
- 160 Columbia Heights — the Promenade-adjacent co-op tier for buyers stepping up
- 2 Grace Court — larger prewar co-op in the district's southern blocks
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 115 Willow Street?
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 115 Willow Street 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.