118 Wooster Street

Six stories, fifty feet wide, a hundred feet deep. The ground floor and most of the cellar are a separate retail condominium unit of about 6,920 square feet; the residential area above runs 16,475 square feet across floors two through six.

As offered in 1983 the building held fifteen residences. Today PLUTO counts thirteen, and the reason is legible in the record: apartments have been combined, and a 2014 alteration application treats 3C and 3D as one apartment. The sixth-floor line is the building's premium product, with private bulkheads and, at 6A, a roof terrace.

The facade is brick, stone and terra cotta rather than cast iron, which matters when a buyer is pricing the difference between this building and the cast-iron fronts up the block. It is a 1907–08 industrial loft, built for light manufacturing, and the interiors have the ceiling heights, window sizes and open plates that follow from that use.

The capital record is that of a well-kept masonry building running normal cycles. A sidewalk shed went up in 2003 during facade repair. In 2004 the condominium replaced wood roof joists, the roof deck, the roofing and the rear brick parapet. In 2015 it filed for another sidewalk shed and for full sidewalk and vault replacement — the vault covers the designation report catalogued. In 2025 it replaced the boiler and installed a new chimney liner, with the gas connection filed alongside. A separate 2025 filing covers private mechanical work adding heat pumps and interior air-conditioning units at the sixth floor, which is a useful signal about how the building is approaching electrification unit by unit.

Because the building sits in the SoHo–Cast Iron Historic District, facade, window and storefront work runs through Landmarks review before the Department of Buildings will sign off, which lengthens schedules and raises unit costs relative to an unlandmarked building.

With thirteen residential owners and a separately owned retail unit, the denominator for a capital assessment is small and the commercial unit's share of common charges is worth understanding precisely. Read the current budget, the reserve position, the retail unit's common-charge allocation, and the most recent Local Law 11 cycle status before contract.

The offering plan on file states the framework directly. The Zoning Resolution required joint living-work quarters for artists to be occupied by no more than four unrelated persons who are certified artists, or by a certified artist and family maintaining a common household; at least one occupant of each residential unit must be certified as a qualified artist by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, failing which there is a violation of the use permitted by the building's certificate of occupancy. The condominium's by-laws restrict the residential units to that use. The purchase package for the building on file includes an Artist in Residence acknowledgment form — so the requirement is administered in practice, not merely recited in a 1983 document.

Two things complicate the picture, and a buyer should understand both.

First, the Department of Buildings occupancy code and the certificate of occupancy do not say the same thing. Alteration applications filed for this building in 2004, 2006 and 2014 record the existing occupancy group as J-2 — the old-code classification for a Class A multiple dwelling — rather than as joint living-work quarters. No certificate of occupancy for this building identification number appears in the Department of Buildings' online records. Where a filing code and a governing document conflict, the governing document and the certificate of occupancy control; the DOB code is a filing convention.

Second, the legal environment changed. The December 2021 SoHo/NoHo rezoning mapped this block into the Special SoHo-NoHo Mixed Use District, in which residential use is permitted and there is a path to convert existing joint living-work quarters to conventional residential use. The rezoning does not amend a condominium's by-laws or its certificate of occupancy by itself. Ask the managing agent whether the building has taken any step to convert its occupancy since 2021, and have your attorney read the current by-laws rather than assuming that the rezoning resolved the question.

In practice, enforcement of artist certification in SoHo has been minimal for decades and lenders have financed these units routinely. That is context, not a legal opinion, and it is not a reason to skip the question.

The Department of Finance's historical J-51 series records a grant against Block 500, lot 9 initiated in 1983: a twelve-year exemption with a 50 percent abatement, on a certified alteration cost of $303,000, producing an annual abatement of $12,625.

The offering plan corroborates and dates it precisely. The plan records that eight and one-third percent of the certified cost per year — $25,250 — was available for J-51 abatement, that abatement benefits commenced January 1, 1984, that the 1983/84 real estate taxes were reduced to zero for the second half of that tax year, and that both exemption and abatement were expected to be fully running by July 1, 1984. The plan also flags a Department of Finance policy under which J-51 benefits apportioned to a unit containing new cubic content are reduced pro rata — a point that affected units 6A, 6B and 6C because of their new roof bulkheads, which the plan characterizes as de minimis.

A twelve-year benefit that began in the 1983/84 tax year burned off in the mid-1990s — roughly thirty years ago. There is no J-51, no 421-a and no 485-x on this building today, and nothing in the record suggests any successor benefit. Underwrite the full unabated bill on the specific unit lot.

Ownership form: Condominium. Transfers close through a right of first refusal rather than cooperative board approval, which normally produces a shorter and more predictable timeline than a co-op — subject to the artist-certification acknowledgment in the purchase package.

Occupancy: joint living-work quarters for artists per the offering plan, the by-laws and the certificate of occupancy. Confirm the building's current position with the managing agent and read the by-laws before contract, particularly if you intend to rent the unit out.

Pets, subletting, pied-à-terre use and financing: house rules and the purchase package are on file, but current terms are set by the board and change. Confirm each with the managing agent at offer stage.

Landmark constraint: any exterior alteration — windows, storefront, ironwork, vault covers, rooftop equipment visible from the street — requires a Landmarks permit before the Department of Buildings will issue one. Buyers planning a window replacement or a rooftop addition should price the review process, not just the construction.

Common-element encumbrances: the flue serving the unit 4A fireplace runs through unit 6A and across its roof terrace and is a common element of the building. Whichever of those two units you are buying, have your attorney read the plan on this point.

Real estate taxes: no abatement. See above.

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.

Market read. Most recent trades (2025) cleared a median $1,370/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 0.0% from the last ask.

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-00500-7501) 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.

Resolve the occupancy question with your attorney, not with the market. The offering plan and by-laws restrict the residences to joint living-work quarters for artists; the 2021 rezoning created a path away from that; the building's current position is a question for the managing agent. Ask it in writing.

The address is a two-address building. City records file 116 and 118 Wooster as one structure on one BIN and one tax lot. Title, appraisal and tax records may use either address. Make sure everyone in the transaction is looking at lot 7501.

Underwrite the full tax bill. The J-51 has been gone for three decades. If any analysis you are handed shows an abated figure, it is wrong.

Check the retail unit's economics. A 6,920-square-foot commercial unit in separate ownership on the ground floor and cellar is a meaningful share of the building. Understand its common-charge allocation and its voting weight.

Sixth floor is different product. Private bulkheads and, at 6A, a roof terrace — and, at 6A, a common-element flue crossing that terrace.

Get in front of the artist-certification question. A buyer's attorney will find it in the by-laws. Sellers who present the plan language, the acknowledgment form and the building's current practice up front lose far less time than sellers who let it surface at contract.

Correct the architecture in the marketing. This is a 1907–08 brick, stone and terra-cotta light-manufacturing loft by Frederick Fabel, not a cast-iron building. The precise version is more interesting than the generic one, and it is what the designation report says.

Distinguish the building from its neighbors. 102 Wooster is four lots south on the same block and is a different building of a different date. Buyers and appraisers conflate them.

Document the capital record. The 2004 roof and parapet work, the 2015 sidewalk and vault replacement, and the 2025 boiler replacement all survive attorney diligence and answer the question buyers of a 118-year-old masonry building actually ask.

If you're considering 118 Wooster Street, also evaluate:

• 102 Wooster Street — four lots south on the same block; an 1891 store building converted around 2001, with the same artist-certification framework and a smaller residence count
• 101 Wooster Street — directly across the street on the west blockfront; the immediate peer by location
• 105 Wooster Street — small SoHo loft conversion on the opposite side of the same stretch
• 139 Wooster Street — SoHo loft condominium two blocks north
• 160 Wooster Street — the northern end of the corridor at a different scale
• 80 Wooster Street — a different block; useful contrast in conversion vintage
• 27 Wooster Street — south SoHo loft conversion
• 42 Wooster Street and 43 Wooster Street — the paired south-SoHo conversions
• 14 Wooster Street — the southernmost Wooster Street profile; a different district and a different product