160 West 85th Street

The engineer's report in the offering plan describes a six-story, sixty-unit building of concrete construction with a brick exterior, concrete walls and ceilings, and wood floors. It has one stairwell running from the first floor to the roof bulkhead. At conversion there was one passenger elevator serving the cellar through the sixth floor, and an oil-fired boiler supplying steam heat. The plan also shows that one ground-floor apartment, 1D, was listed as a doctor's office on the certificate of occupancy. The sponsor had it changed to residential use before the conversion closed.

Listing records show studios and one-bedrooms alongside larger combined apartments. DOB filings show how the combined apartments were made: combinations of 2G with 2H (2007) and 5F with 5G (2014), a renovation of the combined 3G/H in 2019, and several single-apartment renovations since 2002. Most filings are for interior partitions and finishes, which fits a postwar concrete building where layouts can be changed but structural walls stay put.

The building is not in a historic district, so window and façade work needs only DOB approval, not LPC review. That shortens renovation timelines compared with the historic-district buildings at the Columbus Avenue end of the same block.

From audited financial statements on file (2021):

• Income and costs. Maintenance was about $628,000 net of abatements. Total operating expenses were about $733,000. Real estate taxes were about 31 percent of expenses and payroll about 27 percent. The building ran a small operating deficit before depreciation in 2021 and a small surplus in 2020. This is a tight budget with little slack.
• Operating assessment. From October 2015 through December 2021, shareholders paid $0.0625 per share per month. The board also assessed shareholders amounts that substantially offset the cooperative tax abatement. In practice, the building keeps the abatement for its operating budget instead of passing it through as lower maintenance.
• Reserves. About $823,000 in cash and money-market funds at year-end 2021, all board-designated. There is no reserve study (an engineer's estimate of future repair costs), and the governing documents do not require the corporation to build reserves.
• Staff. Building employees are covered by the Local 32BJ union contract.

DOB filings show the capital work: rear and courtyard façade repairs in 2019, about $82,000 filed. Then the September 2026 filing for façade and roof-parapet repairs, about $459,400. That is the largest exterior job on the building's online DOB record, and it is current work, not history. Under Local Law 11, the city's façade inspection law, exterior walls must be inspected every five years and unsafe conditions repaired.

Documented:

• Flip tax: 2 percent of the gross sales price, paid into capital (audited statements on file). Listing records say the buyer pays it.
• House rules, revised in 2014 and amended July 25, 2018 (on file). At least 80 percent of each room's floor must be covered with rugs or equivalent sound-reducing material, except kitchens, bathrooms, closets and foyers. Storage is first-come, first-served, and fees are set by the board. Smoking is banned in all common areas and within 25 feet of entrances and air intakes.
• Occupancy declaration. The purchase application on file asks buyers to affirm they are not buying for investment and to state whether the apartment will be a primary or secondary residence. The form clearly allows for secondary-residence buyers, but the board decides each case.
• Pets. Permitted under the house rules with board approval. The application asks for breed, type and weight.

Not documented: the financing ceiling, the post-closing liquidity requirement, sublet terms and fees, and whether trusts or LLCs may buy. Get these from the managing agent in writing before you make an offer.

Recent sales

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-01215-0056) 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.

Get the 2024 loan terms and the 2026 façade budget together. A cooperative that had no debt in 2021 now carries a $2,000,000 mortgage. The rate, the maturity and whether it is interest-only affect your maintenance. So does the size of the façade job filed this month. Ask whether the work is fully funded by the loan and reserves, or whether an assessment is planned.

Treat the tax abatement as part of the budget, not a discount. The board has historically assessed shareholders amounts that roughly offset the cooperative abatement. Your effective monthly cost is the maintenance plus that assessment. Run the True Monthly Carrying Cost Calculator on the specific apartment.

Ask about remaining rent-regulated apartments. A non-eviction conversion can leave long-term rent-regulated tenancies in place for decades. Ask how many remain and who holds the shares. This affects the owner-occupancy figures your lender will ask for.

Confirm the apartment you are buying. Several combinations are on record. Check the share allocation and the alteration agreement history for your apartment.

Get ahead of the façade question. Buyers' attorneys will find the September 2026 DOB filing. Have the managing agent's answer on scope, schedule and funding ready before the first showing.

Sell the flexibility. Pets with approval, secondary-residence buyers considered, and gifts, guarantors and co-purchasing considered case by case. That widens the buyer pool. Get it confirmed in writing and put it in the listing package.

Say clearly that it is postwar. Some listing records call the building prewar. City records say 1950. A buyer who finds the gap later will be less trusting of everything else. Market the building for what it is: a low, well-proportioned postwar elevator co-op with no landmark review for renovations.

If you're considering 160 West 85th Street, also evaluate:

• 316 West 84th Street — a 1949 cooperative, the closest postwar match on the Upper West Side side streets
• 15 West 84th Street — a 1947 full-service cooperative on a park block; the postwar step up
• 315 West End Avenue — a 1948 cooperative on the avenue
• 11 Riverside Drive and 70 Riverside Drive — early-1950s cooperatives on the Drive
• 130 West 86th Street — a 1926 prewar cooperative one block north; the prewar alternative near the same subway
• 151 West 86th Street and 161 West 86th Street — prewar cooperatives on the next block
• 160 West 87th Street — a prewar cooperative two blocks north between Columbus and Amsterdam
• 139 West 82nd Street — a larger prewar cooperative between Columbus and Amsterdam, three blocks south