- Year built
- 2003
- Type
- Condominium
- Units
- 12
- Floors
- 13
- Landmark
- No
- Pets
- Permitted per management-sourced records; confirm the house rules for weight or number limits
Every recorded sale at this building, 2004–2026
Price-per-square-foot over time, the line- and floor-premium curves, and every recorded sale.
- Median $/sf
- $1,834
- Listing discount
- 4.5%
- Recorded sales
- 32
- On record
- 2004–2026
West 22nd Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues is a landmark-free gap in a heavily landmarked neighborhood. The Chelsea Historic District protects the blocks west of Eighth Avenue; the Ladies' Mile Historic District protects the blocks east toward Fifth. This particular stretch is protected by neither, and the practical consequence is visible from the sidewalk: it is one of the few Chelsea blocks where a low commercial building could be demolished and replaced by a thirteen-story residential one without a Certificate of Appropriateness. In February 2002 a two-story commercial structure at 146–148 West 22nd Street was filed for demolition. Four months later a new-building application went in for the thirteen-story, 135-foot building that stands there now.
What went up is small and deliberately so. Twelve residences in roughly 26,000 square feet of residential area means floor-through and full-floor living across almost the whole stack, at a time when Chelsea's new construction was mostly producing corridor buildings with six and eight apartments to a floor. The design, by Meltzer/Mandl Architects, holds the streetwall for three stories, then steps back at the flanks and again above the seventh floor. Those setbacks are not a stylistic gesture — they are the reason nearly every residence in the building has private outdoor space, and outdoor space is the single most durable pricing variable here.
The building was developed by Alchemy Properties, a firm whose Manhattan work has consistently favored small unit counts on interior lots rather than large towers. The Paradigm is a clean example of the type: a full-envelope building on a 41-foot lot, built to a C6-3A residential FAR of 7.52 with essentially nothing left over, delivering a dozen large apartments and one ground-floor commercial unit.
The fact buyers most often miss is the tax posture, and it cuts in the building's favor rather than against it. Every unit lot at The Paradigm carried a ten-year 421-a exemption, uncapped. That benefit ran down through the assessment rolls and expired after the FY2014/15 roll year. The apartments have been taxed at full assessment since FY2015/16. There is nothing left to burn off, no step-up ahead, and no cliff waiting in a future tax year — a materially different underwriting position from newer Chelsea inventory where the headline monthly figure still reflects an abatement that has years left to unwind.
Architecture and unit composition
The lot is a 41-foot interior parcel roughly 99 feet deep, which governs the plan. With no corner and no protected flank exposures at the base, the design concentrates glazing on the West 22nd Street elevation and on the rear, and uses the side setbacks above the third floor to open light on the flanks where the neighboring low-rise buildings fall away. That is a real gain in a mid-block Chelsea building, and it is also a risk to understand: the adjacent parcels are themselves developable, and light gained across a neighboring roofline is not permanent light in the way a landmarked frontage is.
Residences are predominantly floor-through, two and three bedrooms, with the living end facing north to the street and bedrooms facing south. The private outdoor space is distributed unevenly — some residences have a rear balcony, the setback floors have terraces, and the penthouse carries the most. In a twelve-unit building that variation is the whole pricing conversation; there is no "typical" line here, and a building-wide average tells a buyer almost nothing.
The common roof deck is the building's one shared amenity of consequence, and it is landscaped and open to the sky in a part of Chelsea where the surrounding building heights are low enough for the outlook to work.
Building operations
The Paradigm is a self-managed-scale condominium with a very small denominator: twelve residences carry every fixed cost of the building, including the elevator, the roof deck, the mechanical plant and the façade obligation. There is no doorman. Access runs on fob entry, a video intercom and a key-locked elevator that opens directly into residences — a specification that buys privacy and saves payroll, and one that some buyers coming from staffed buildings find is not a trade they want.
Two operating items deserve attention at diligence. The first is the ground-floor commercial unit, which is a separate condominium unit with its own common interest; ask how it participates in common expenses, what the tenancy is, and whether the residential board has any control over its use. The second is the façade. The building is a masonry elevation now more than twenty years old and well into its Local Law 11 inspection cycles; on a twelve-owner budget, a façade scope arrives as a large per-unit number. Ask for the current cycle filing, the most recent engineer's report and the reserve position before pricing anything.
Policy framework
Ownership form: Condominium. Residences convey as deeded real property. The Board of Managers exercises a right of first refusal on sales and, in most condominium by-laws of this vintage, on leases as well — confirm which applies here from the by-laws.
Pets: Permitted per management-sourced records. Confirm number, weight and breed rules against the house rules.
Subletting, pied-à-terre, LLC and trust ownership: All permitted under the standard condominium framework. This is the practical reason a building like this trades to a broader buyer pool than a comparably sized Chelsea co-op.
Fees: No flip tax is documented in public records. A working capital contribution at closing, along with move-in and application fees, is the norm in buildings of this type and should be confirmed with the managing agent rather than assumed.
Real estate taxes: Underwrite full unabated taxes against the current bill for the specific unit. The 421-a benefit is gone and is not coming back.
Local Law 97
- 2024–2029 annual penalty
- $0 (under cap)
- 2030–2034 annual penalty
- $4,951/yr
- Per unit / month range
- $0 – $34
Source: NYC LL84 benchmarking and PLUTO · The Roebling Research Library. City record last verified September 2026.
See full Local Law 97 analysis — emissions history, scenarios, methodology →Facade safety — Local Law 11
The latest available FISP filing classified the facade as Safe — no repairs were required at that inspection. Facade inspections run on a fixed five-year cycle; future inspection, repair, and any assessment decisions remain building-specific.
How to read this, and where it comes from
QEWI = Qualified Exterior Wall Inspector — the licensed engineer the city requires to sign the report (the independent expert, not the managing agent).
Penalties shown are amounts DOB assessed against filings on record across 2010–15 to 2020–25. The FISP dataset does not record whether they were paid, contested or remain open, so treat the figure as history rather than a current balance and confirm the building’s standing with the managing agent.
Source: NYC DOB facade filings (FISP) · The Roebling Research Library. City record last verified September 2026.
Recent sales
The Paradigm trades as boutique Chelsea new construction of the early-2000s generation, and the comparison set is other small full-envelope buildings on the West 20s side streets rather than the amenity towers on Sixth and Seventh Avenues. Pricing inside the building is driven by three things, roughly in order: the amount and usability of private outdoor space; floor and light, since the setback floors gain exposure the lower floors do not have; and condition, because a twenty-year-old interior in a building at this price point is now a renovation conversation.
The resale record on the twelve residential unit lots runs continuously from the first closings in mid-2004 through the present, to unrelated third-party purchasers, in ordinary arm's-length deeds. Nothing in the recorded chain suggests a sponsor-retained or rental-wrapped position. Unit-level transaction history is maintained in The Roebling Research Library and shared with clients during diligence.
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.
| Date | Unit | Apartment | Price | PPSF | vs. Ask |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 9, 2026 | PH | 2 BR · 2 BA · 1,540 sf | $2,825,000 | $1,834/sf | -4.2% |
| May 12, 2023 | 12 | 2 BR · 2 BA · 1,548 sf | $2,545,000 | $1,644/sf | -1.9% |
| Apr 18, 2023 | 8 | 3 BR · 3 BA · 2,544 sf | $4,200,000 | $1,651/sf | -1.2% |
| Mar 10, 2023 | 2 | 3 BR · 3 BA · 2,615 sf | $4,500,000 | $1,721/sf | off-mkt |
| Sep 7, 2022 | 4 | 3 BR · 3 BA · 2,544 sf | $4,172,500 | $1,640/sf | -9.2% |
| Mar 21, 2019 | 4 | 3 BR · 3 BA · 2,544 sf | $3,915,000 | $1,539/sf | -2.0% |
| Jan 30, 2019 | 10 | 2 BR · 1,548 sf | $3,025,000 | $1,954/sf | +0.0% |
| Jun 20, 2018 | 7 | 3 BR · 2,554 sf | $3,800,000 | $1,488/sf | -12.6% |
Market read. Most recent trades (2026) cleared a median $1,834/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 4.5% from the last ask — a recurring negotiation gap worth pricing into any offer or listing strategy.
The retrade record
Lines that have traded more than once in the public record — the building’s appreciation arc, apartment by apartment.
Full closing history with price-per-square-foot over time, the complete retrade record, and every line that has traded.
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-00797-7505) 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.
What to know if you’re buying
The tax line is already at its ceiling. There is no abatement to unwind. Compare the monthly carrying number here directly against newer Chelsea inventory whose sticker taxes are still artificially low, and run both through the True Monthly Carrying Cost Calculator before drawing a conclusion about which is cheaper to hold.
Buy the outdoor space, and measure it. Terrace and balcony square footage varies substantially between residences. Confirm what is deeded to the unit, what is a limited common element, and who is responsible for waterproofing and repair beneath it.
Twelve owners is a small denominator. Ask for the operating budget, the reserve balance, the façade cycle status and any assessment history. Small buildings can be run beautifully, but a single capital event lands hard.
There is no doorman. Package handling, deliveries and service access all run differently here than in a staffed building. Spend time in the lobby before deciding it is a fit.
The neighbors are developable. Nothing on either flank is landmarked. Light gained over a neighboring roof is worth having but should not be underwritten as permanent.
What to know if you’re selling
Lead with the plate. Floor-through and full-floor residences in a twelve-unit building are the product. Square footage per dollar, direct-to-residence elevator access and the outdoor space are the arguments that carry against larger, more anonymous new-development stock nearby.
Present the tax position as a feature. Sophisticated Chelsea buyers check the roll and know what an unwinding abatement does to a carrying number three years out. A fully taxed unit with a stable monthly is a genuine advantage — say so with the numbers rather than letting a buyer discover it.
Same-building comparables are thin. With twelve residences, pricing is a line-by-line and floor-by-floor exercise supported by the wider Chelsea boutique-condominium set, not by a building average.
Document the building. Budget, reserves, façade status and any completed capital work survive attorney diligence and shorten it.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 146 West 22nd Street, also evaluate:
- 133 West 22nd Street — 2008 ground-up boutique condominium on the same block; the closest like-for-like on vintage and scale
- 125 West 22nd Street — 2006 condominium directly across the street; the other new-construction option on the blockfront
- 126 West 22nd Street — 1910 loft building gut-converted in 1999; the prewar-conversion alternative next door
- 140 West 22nd Street — 1911 loft converted in 2008; larger plates, prewar bones, immediate neighbor
- 162 West 22nd Street — 1950 cooperative on the same block; the co-op alternative at a lower price and stricter policy tier
- 40 West 22nd Street — circa-1909 loft cooperative converted in 1976; the full-floor prewar co-op counterpoint
- 142 West 19th Street — 2021 ground-up seven-residence condominium; the newer, smaller boutique alternative
- 245 Seventh Avenue — 1911 loft converted in the mid-1990s; the avenue-facing conversion two blocks south
- 121 West 20th Street — 1890s loft converted in 1991; the earlier-generation conversion at similar unit scale
- 130 West 19th Street — Chelsea condominium a few blocks south; a useful cross-check on the corridor's pricing
The neighborhood
For the full corridor — architecture, schools, transit, and pricing across Chelsea — read The Roebling Team Guide to Chelsea.
How to read the facts on this page. Items attributed to an offering plan describe the building as it was offered at that filing — unit mix, square footage, the amenity program as planned. They are not a statement about how the building operates today. Tax and compliance figures are sourced separately to current City records and carry their own dates. House rules, staffing and fee policy can change by board resolution without any public filing: treat every policy line here as a starting point for diligence and confirm it with the managing agent.
Considering a move at The Paradigm?
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