The Barrington (203 West 81st Street)

Nine stories and 59,153 square feet across 55 apartments works out to a generous gross average, and the building reads as what it is: a solidly built early pre-war apartment house on a mid-block Upper West Side lot, brick above a masonry base, a regular punched-window elevation, and an entrance set back from the street line behind a small light court. The architect is not documented, and we do not guess at one. The construction date is likewise unsettled — a new-building application numbered 672-11 points to 1911, while the city's year-built field says 1920.

The building is over-built relative to R8B zoning, at roughly 5.15 FAR against a 4.0 residential maximum. That is a common condition for pre-war stock on these blocks and it has two consequences worth naming: there are no air rights to sell or build on, and the building's floor plates are larger than anything that could be constructed on the lot today.

Apartments run from studios and one-bedrooms through larger pre-war layouts, and because the conversion released units piecemeal over four decades, the condition spread inside the building is wide. Some apartments came out of long-term rent-regulated tenancy essentially untouched; others have been gut-renovated by owners since 2004. Ceiling heights and pre-war detail are the building's product; renovation status is the building's price variable. There is no useful building-average price per foot here — line, floor, exposure and condition each move the number materially.

The Barrington runs as a staffed union building. Labor is by far the largest expense line in the audited statements — payroll, payroll taxes, union benefits, uniforms and workers' compensation together accounted for roughly $683,000 in 2021, a little over half of total operating expense. Union benefits alone ran about $191,000, and the association participates in the Local 32BJ multiemployer pension plan, which the statements disclose as being in Red Zone status with a rehabilitation plan in place. That is an industry-wide condition rather than a building-specific one, but it belongs in a buyer's understanding of why labor costs in this building rise the way they do.

Other operating detail from the statements on file: the central laundry room is leased to an outside operator on a seven-year term that began in November 2018, producing a fixed annual fee; storage lockers are rented to unit owners; and the former superintendent's apartment, unit 1C, has been let by the association since 2015 and now runs month to month, producing rental income to the operating fund.

Recent capital work documented in the statements: the hot water system was replaced in 2021 under a contract of roughly $68,000 including change orders, with an outside engineering firm producing the plans and monitoring the work; the building also carried out water-pipe work and a water-pressure evaluation. Hurricane flooding in 2021 caused roughly $144,000 of damage, substantially all of which was recovered through an insurance claim in the same year. Façade restoration also appears among the betterments in the years on file, and Department of Buildings filings record repeated exterior repair cycles with sidewalk sheds in 2002, 2006, 2009 and 2013 — the ordinary Local Law 11 rhythm, which should be traced forward to the current cycle in diligence.

Ownership form: Condominium. There is no board approval and no interview. A sale or a lease proceeds by a notice of intention delivered to the board of managers, after which the board has thirty days to exercise or waive its right of first refusal. In practice the board waives and issues a waiver certificate, and closings run on a condominium timetable rather than a cooperative one.

Application package: Substantial for a condominium. The package on file calls for an introduction letter, the executed contract of sale, the notice of intention, a certified financial statement, two years of federal and state or city tax returns, bank statements, employment and personal references, an emergency contact form, signed house-rules, move-in/move-out and smoking-policy riders, and — where financed — a fully executed lender commitment letter. A non-refundable application fee is payable with the package, and move-in requires a deposit refundable after inspection.

Pets: Permitted. The house rules provide for removal of any animal found by the board to be a nuisance or hazard, and require dogs to be leashed in all common elements.

Pied-à-terre, subletting, LLC, trust and foreign ownership: All permitted under the standard condominium framework. Confirm minimum lease terms and any leasing frequency limits with the managing agent.

Flip tax: Not documented in the records reviewed. Confirm before pricing a sale.

Real estate taxes: No abatement of any kind. Underwrite the full unabated tax on the specific unit lot, and note that the tax certiorari reductions the board won for 2015/16 and 2016/17 have long since run off.

Assessments: None currently disclosed in the statements on file. The 10 percent assessment that ran from 2008 was reduced and ended on 30 June 2020. Ask for the current-year budget and any assessment adopted since the last statements you are given.

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 (2026) cleared a median $1,325/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 1.6% from the last ask — a recurring negotiation gap worth pricing into any offer or listing strategy.

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-01229-7501) 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.

Read the arrears history in the financials, then ask what it looks like now. The 2020 and 2021 statements document six investor-owned apartments in serious common-charge arrears, five of them foreclosed and resolved by year-end 2021. Ask the managing agent for the current arrears schedule and the current count of investor-owned and tenant-occupied units. The condition is legacy, not necessarily current, but you should know where it stands.

There is no reserve study. The auditors say so directly, and the required disclosure of estimated future major repairs is omitted. With no mortgage debt the board has borrowing capacity, but a 1910s–20s building with no funded capital plan is an assessment risk. Get the current budget and reserve balance.

The building is not landmarked, and the block is a strange one. Two historic districts touch this tax block without covering this lot. That means exterior alteration here is a DOB matter, not an LPC matter — but it also means the buildings immediately around you are protected and this one is not.

Ignore the 52-unit figure. There are 55 residential units, confirmed by the recorded unit lots, the offering plan and the audited statements.

Condition is the price. Because units were released from rental over four decades, two apartments of the same size on the same line can be entirely different products. Underwrite the renovation, not the building average — run the Renovation Cost Calculator before you set a number.

Lead with the ownership form. Pre-war condominium is the scarce commodity on these blocks. Buyers priced out of, or unwilling to face, a co-op board are a real and identifiable pool, and the thirty-day right-of-first-refusal timetable is a genuine selling point against a two-to-three-month co-op admissions process.

Present the finances proactively. No mortgage debt, three funded accounts, the assessment concluded in 2020, and modest common-charge increases are a strong package. Getting the statements in front of a buyer's attorney early is better than letting the arrears note in the notes to the financials surface cold in diligence.

Be honest about the reserve study gap. Sophisticated counsel will find it. Pairing it with the debt-free balance sheet is the right framing.

Price against condition, not against the building. With a renovation spread this wide, an unrenovated apartment marketed at renovated pricing will sit. Set the number from the plan and the finish level outward.

If you're considering The Barrington, also evaluate:

• 223 West 80th Street — pre-war building one block south in the same mid-block condition; the nearest direct comparison
• 250 West 81st Street (Two Fifty West 81st) — same street, different tax block; a useful check on how pricing moves west of Broadway
• 207 West 79th Street — pre-war building two blocks south between Amsterdam and Broadway
• 112 West 79th Street — mid-block pre-war on the same corridor
• 100 West 80th Street (The Orleans) — corner pre-war at Columbus; the avenue-frontage alternative
• 101 West 78th Street (The Evelyn) — landmarked pre-war a few blocks south; the comparison for what designation changes
• 2250 Broadway (The Broadway) — the Broadway-frontage alternative one block east
• 2273 Broadway (The Saxony) — pre-war on the same tax block, inside the Riverside–West End Historic District Extension I
• The Bromley (225 West 83rd Street) — full-service post-war condominium two blocks north; the amenity-building alternative