1212 Fifth Avenue

The building occupies a 10,092-square-foot corner lot with roughly 101 feet on Fifth Avenue and 100 feet on East 102nd Street, and carries about 96,980 gross square feet, of which roughly 94,472 is residential and 2,508 is the two professional units at the base. Its floor-area ratio as built is 9.61 against a residential FAR of 7.52 for the R9 district — recorded gross floor area exceeds that simple comparison, which does not by itself establish legal zoning floor area or what future work is permitted.

The elevation is a prewar masonry composition: limestone base, brick above, punched casement windows, and a plain cornice line. The conversion replaced the windows with new casements rather than substituting a modern sash, which is the reason the façade still reads as of its period. Inside, the wings each carry two homes per floor with keyed elevator access, so the effective density is four residences to a landing on the typical floor. Terraces exist at the 16th-floor roof, appurtenant to the penthouse and to Unit 16 South; the roof is otherwise closed to residents by house rule.

Homes were marketed from one to five bedrooms. The conversion's design premise was preservation of the prewar plan logic — restored plaster ceilings and moldings, solid wood floors, fireplaces in select residences — with the kitchens and baths redone outright. Buyers walking a specific line should ask which of the original details survived in that unit, since the work was done residence by residence and the answer is not uniform.

The building runs full-service: 24-hour concierge, a live-in resident manager, and a staff covered by the collective bargaining agreement with SEIU Local 32BJ. Amenity space is modest by new-development standards and generous for a 57-unit prewar conversion — a fitness center of more than 2,600 square feet with separate cardio and training studios and a yoga room, a children's playroom, and a residents' lounge that can be booked for private events. There is common laundry and paid storage.

The condominium owns the resident manager's residence outright. It purchased Unit 2D from the declarant in 2015 and financed the purchase with a $1,395,000 bank mortgage recorded December 17, 2015 — a ten-year term at a fixed 4.19 percent, monthly principal and interest of $7,558, maturing in January 2026 with a balloon payment of approximately $1,003,900. That balloon has now come due. Any buyer should ask the managing agent directly how it was resolved: refinanced, paid from reserves, or funded by assessment. The answer materially changes the building's near-term financial picture and it will not appear in any listing.

The capital record is well documented. The board approved a $1,000,000 assessment payable over eighteen months beginning July 1, 2019 to fund a façade and parapet program, and paused collection for four months in 2020. The work itself ran to $1,426,350, paid out across 2019, 2020 and a final installment in March 2021, with Howard L. Zimmerman Architects overseeing. The base contract ($664,985) and change orders ($712,938) account for $1,377,923 of that total; the remaining $48,427 is not itemized in the figures summarized here, so confirm it against the audited statements. Reserves stood at $717,699 at the end of 2020, down from $1,252,427 a year earlier, which is what paying for a seven-figure façade job out of pocket looks like on a balance sheet. Common charge income ran $1,633,869 in both 2019 and 2020, with a 2 percent increase taken in February 2018 and none planned for 2021.

One further item belongs on the record because the audited statements expressly permit its disclosure. The board pursued construction claims against the sponsor arising from issues its engineers identified after the conversion, and settled them: the sponsor paid $775,000 to the board and waived roughly $160,000 in claimed reimbursements, with a mutual release and no admission of liability. Buyers should read the settlement in context — it is a normal outcome for a large conversion, it was resolved on terms favorable to the condominium, and the sellout was complete with no declarant-held units by the end of 2020. But it is a fact of the building's history and it is better learned here than in diligence.

Ownership form: Condominium. Transfers proceed by board right of first refusal rather than cooperative approval, though the managing agent runs a full purchase application and package — expect a more document-heavy process than the condominium form implies.

Pets: Permitted. Orderly domestic pets with the board's or managing agent's written consent, revocable at their discretion, and a limit of two pets per unit without further consent. Pets travel in designated elevators and must be carried or leashed in common areas.

Subletting: Permitted under Article 7 of the by-laws. Transient occupancy — any arrangement compensating the owner for occupancy of under 30 days in the owner's absence — is prohibited outright, with a $5,000 fine for a first violation and $10,000 for each after.

Smoking: Banned in every common area. Since September 1, 2018, banned in all leased residential units and on their terraces and balconies, with the prohibition required in every new lease.

House rules of note: At least 80 percent of the floor area of each residence, excluding kitchens, pantries, baths, closets and foyers, must be carpeted or covered in equally effective noise-reducing material. Construction and repair work is restricted to weekdays, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Barbecuing is prohibited except in areas the board designates. The board levies fines on an escalating schedule from $250 to $1,000 for general rule violations.

Financing and minimum down: Not documented in the records reviewed. Confirm with the managing agent.

Flip tax: Not documented in the records reviewed. Confirm any resale capital contribution with the managing agent before pricing a sale.

Real estate taxes — no abatement. No exemption of any kind appears on the residential unit lots (1101 through 1157) in the Department of Finance exemption records for fiscal years 2021 through 2027. The property's only J-51 benefit was taken on the pre-conversion lot in 1981 — a twelve-year exemption with a 90 percent abatement — and it ran through tax year 1992 and burned off. The 2009-to-2011 conversion produced no J-51 and no other exemption. Residences have been taxed at full assessment since the first closing. Underwrite the actual current bill on the specific unit, not a projection.

Recent sales

Recent closings at this building, from The Roebling Research Library. 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. $/sf is measured on the latest sales with reliable square footage (2024): a median $1,839/sf (floor-adjusted) across 1 sale. The building has traded as recently as 2026. Median listing discount 0.0% from the last ask.

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-01607-7502; each condominium apartment is its own tax lot). Apartment-level facts (line, condition, asking-price context) curated and cross-verified in The Roebling Research Library. 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.

Reconcile the unit counts. PLUTO reports 53 residential units, while the condominium materials describe 55 residential and 2 professional units, matching 57 recorded unit lots. Check dates, unit classifications and the inputs used in any valuation model; this discrepancy alone does not establish that a model’s output is wrong.

Ask about the resident manager's unit mortgage. A roughly $1,003,900 balloon came due in January 2026 on the loan the condominium took to buy Unit 2D. How the board handled it is the single most useful current fact about this building's finances, and it is not public.

Read the façade history. The building funded a $1,426,350 façade and parapet program with a $1,000,000 assessment and its reserves between 2019 and 2021. Ask what the next cycle looks like and what the current reserve position is.

Understand the sponsor settlement. It is disclosed in the audited statements and it is closed. Ask the managing agent whether any of the underlying conditions recur, and have your engineer look specifically at the areas the conversion touched.

There is no landmark constraint and no abatement. Both cut the same way: exterior work is faster and cheaper to approve than in a historic district, and taxes are full freight. Neither is what a buyer coming from Carnegie Hill will assume.

Test the location honestly. This is Fifth Avenue at 102nd Street. The park frontage is real, the Museum Mile institutions are a short walk south, and the neighborhood north and east of the building is a different market from the one ten blocks down. Walk it at more than one hour of the day.

Lead with the park and the plan. Direct Central Park frontage, two homes per wing per floor, and a 1925 Blum building are specific features to document and compare with competing properties.

Get ahead of the tax question. Buyers assume a 2011 conversion carries J-51. This one does not. Presenting the full unabated number with a carrying-cost analysis up front produces better outcomes than letting it surface late.

Price against the right set. Unadjusted comparables drawn from Carnegie Hill co-ops can misprice the unit in either direction. Build the set from park-front condominiums and converted prewar condominiums, then adjust for the corridor position.

Line and floor matter more than the building average. Park-facing, rear-facing and 102nd Street exposures are separate products in a building of 55 residences. Price the line.

If you're considering 1212 Fifth Avenue, also evaluate:

• 1270 Fifth Avenue — the nearest park-front alternative on the same avenue above Carnegie Hill; the closest peer by position
• 1165 Fifth Avenue — prewar Fifth Avenue building at the top of Carnegie Hill; the co-op alternative with park frontage
• 1158 Fifth Avenue — prewar Fifth Avenue apartment house a few blocks south; different tenure, comparable bones
• 1148 Fifth Avenue — Carnegie Hill prewar on the park; the traditional benchmark this building is priced against
• 1136 Fifth Avenue — prewar Fifth Avenue building inside the historic district; useful for isolating what designation is worth
• 1125 Fifth Avenue — Carnegie Hill park-front building; another point on the same curve
• 1120 Fifth Avenue — prewar Fifth Avenue apartment house; comparable scale and vintage
• 1107 Fifth Avenue — a prewar address on upper Fifth to include in a dated, adjusted comparable set
• 180 East 88th Street — Carnegie Hill new-construction condominium; the modern alternative for a condominium buyer
• 1289 Lexington Avenue — 2019 Carnegie Hill condominium; contemporary product at a different price and policy posture
• 115 East 86th Street — 1928 building converted from rental in 1982; the older conversion comparison