277 Washington Avenue (Francine Towers)
277 Washington Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11205
BBL 3019180013 · BIN 3055090
- Year built
- 1925
- Type
- Cooperative
- Units
- 65
- Floors
- 6
- Landmark
- Designated
Own an apartment here? See what it would sell for.
A Private Pricing Opinion — what your apartment at Francine Towers would likely sell for today, what it costs to sell, and what you’d walk away with — reviewed personally against condition, exposures, renovation quality, and the competition actually on the market.
Clinton Hill's historic district is a district of mansions, row houses and churches. Its apartment houses are few, and the ones that exist are mostly small walk-ups. Francine Towers is the exception on this stretch of Washington Avenue: six stories, an elevator, roughly 65 apartments on a 13,200-square-foot lot, built around 1925 on the avenue between Willoughby and DeKalb, a short block from the Pratt Institute campus. It gives the district something it otherwise barely has — prewar elevator co-op inventory at scale, inside landmark boundaries, a few minutes from the G.
It is also a mid-1980s Brooklyn conversion with a long, readable public record. Park Place Associates bought the building in January 1984 and deeded it to Francine Towers Owners Corp. in June 1986. Since ACRIS began indexing co-op share transfers in the mid-2000s it has recorded more than 80 share-transfer filings here, across more than 40 different apartment designations. The building trades regularly and to unrelated buyers. That is the first thing a buyer should know: this is a functioning resale co-op, with no single holder controlling most of the shares.
The second thing is less tidy. The holder of unsold shares, Park Place LLC, is still in the record. It sold shares steadily from 2005 through 2009, again in 2013, and most recently in February 2026. Forty years after conversion, some apartments are evidently still held by the sponsor side. How many, whether they are occupied by non-purchasing tenants, and what share of maintenance they carry are not in the public record. At a 65-unit co-op those numbers bear on governance, on the corporation's receivables, and on how lenders underwrite the building. Ask for them first.
The third thing is the tax position, and it is simple: there is no abatement left to lose. The corporation drew a sequence of J-51 abatements tied to capital work from 1987 onward, and by our reading of the Department of Finance record the last of them was used up in the early 2020s. The current roll carries none. The carrying cost you see is the unabated number.
Architecture and unit composition
The building is a six-story brick apartment house of the 1920s elevator generation, which the LPC's district database classes as Romanesque. It sits within an R6B contextual district on a lot of about 13,200 square feet, with roughly 56,800 square feet of floor area, all residential. The LPC's records list two building identification numbers on the lot under the 277–281 Washington Avenue designation, consistent with an apartment house that reads as more than one section along the avenue frontage.
Apartment designations in the ACRIS record run A through K on each floor, which means roughly ten or eleven apartments per floor over six floors. This is a building of studios, one-bedrooms and two-bedrooms, with a handful of larger combined residences. The Department of Buildings file documents one of those combinations directly: a filing signed off in 2000 legalized the merger of apartments 2D, 3D and 3E into a single duplex with a convenience stair and one kitchen removed. That filing is the most likely explanation for the gap between PLUTO's 66 units and the 65 in listing records.
Line and floor matter here in the ordinary prewar way. Washington Avenue exposures face the district's streetscape, rear lines face the interior of the block toward Hall Street, and upper floors take more light over the surrounding row-house roofline. Share allocations and line-by-line layouts are not documented in sources we can verify; request the schedule from the managing agent.
Building operations
Capital history, per Department of Buildings filings. The file for BIN 3055090 shows steady, conventional capital work rather than deferral: domestic water-supply piping replaced throughout the building (filed 2004); sprinkler heads added in a common space (2008); parapet and façade repairs (2009); a boiler replacement with a dual-fuel gas/oil burner and a new hot-water heater, signed off after a 2018 filing, plus a new chimney liner the same year; minor roof repairs (2018); and a larger façade-repair and roof-replacement job filed in 2019. Sidewalk sheds and scaffolding were permitted in 2010 and 2017 in connection with remedial work. Ask whether the 2019 façade and roof job has been closed out, and where the building stands in its current Local Law 11 façade cycle.
J-51 history and burn-off, per Department of Finance records. The historical J-51 file for this lot shows several separate abatement grants, each for 90 percent of certified reasonable cost, spread over the permitted term:
- Grants beginning in the 1987 and 1988 tax years, drawn down fully by the 1998–1999 tax years
- A grant beginning in 1991, drawn down fully in the 2002 tax year
- A grant beginning in 2009, with its remaining balance exhausted in the 2019 tax year by the file's own arithmetic
- A grant beginning in 2012, which still had a balance at the last year the historical file covers (2018). At its annual draw that balance ran out in the 2022–2023 tax years
The current exemption file, covering the 2025/26 and 2026/27 tax years, carries no J-51 line for the corporation. The building is paying unabated taxes. Confirm with the managing agent that nothing further is pending.
Underlying mortgage. ACRIS shows a consolidated underlying mortgage of $3.9 million recorded in 2018, succeeding earlier consolidations in 2003 and 2011. The maturity date, rate and any credit line are not in the public record. Ask for the current audited financial statements, the mortgage terms and maturity, the reserve balance and any assessment history.
Management. The building is professionally managed. The managing agent's identity, staffing and the service model (virtual or attended lobby, live-in superintendent) are not documented in sources we can verify.
Recent sales
Francine Towers trades as a prewar elevator co-op inside a landmark district, and it should be priced per room against the handful of comparable buildings in Clinton Hill and Fort Greene, not against the neighborhood's condominium inventory or its row-house floor-throughs. Liquidity is real: the building has recorded a steady flow of share transfers for two decades, and eight in the most recent 24 months. Prices have spread widely, with combined and larger apartments now trading far above the building's one-bedroom tier, so line and layout drive price more than floor does. Because the J-51 abatements are finished, maintenance comparisons across years are cleaner here than at many 1980s conversions: there is no burning-off benefit hidden in recent sales. Unit-level transaction history is maintained in The Roebling Research Library and shared with clients during diligence.
The retrade record
Lines that have traded more than once in the public record — the building’s appreciation arc, apartment by apartment.
Recent transfers at this building, sourced from NYC Department of Finance records. Apartment-level detail (line, condition, asking-price context) verified upon consultation request.
| Date | Unit | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Feb 6, 2026 | 4C | $1,211,000 |
| Nov 19, 2025 | 2B | $750,000 |
| Aug 13, 2025 | 4K | $1,300,000 |
| Jul 8, 2025 | 2C | $1,045,000 |
| Jun 9, 2025 | 6C | $1,300,000 |
| Feb 13, 2025 | 5E | $699,000 |
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-01918-0013) 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.
At the recent median sale of $1.04M (8 transfers since 2024), a buyer putting 25% down would pay about $22,919 to close, or 2.2% of the price.
- Mansion tax: $10,450
- No mortgage recording tax or title insurance on a co-op purchase
- Attorneys, lender, building fees and filings: $12,469
Assumes a resale (the seller pays transfer taxes), a $4,500 attorney fee and a mortgage on the rest.
Keep up with Francine Towers and its market
The Roebling Report, monthly: Manhattan sales data and analysis, including buildings likeFrancine Towers. Unsubscribe anytime.
We’ll use your email for The Roebling Report and note your interest in this building. See our privacy policy.
What to know if you’re buying
Get the policy stack in writing before you price. Board package requirements, the interview, the financing ceiling and minimum down payment, the sublet policy, any flip tax, and the board's position on pied-à-terre use, gifting, co-purchasing and purchases through a trust or LLC are all undocumented in the public record. Each one changes what a given buyer can pay.
Ask how many apartments the holder of unsold shares still owns. Park Place LLC sold shares as recently as February 2026. Ask for the count, whether those apartments are occupied by non-purchasing tenants and under what regulatory status, whether the holder is current on maintenance, and what the offering plan allows it to do with them. In a 65-unit building a sponsor-side block of even a few apartments matters to lenders.
Underwrite unabated maintenance. No J-51 benefit remains. Read the budget for a recent or planned maintenance increase, and read the capital plan for anything left open from the 2019 façade and roof filing.
Confirm the unit count for your apartment. PLUTO says 66, listing records say 65, and a 2000 combination explains the difference. Your share allocation, not the headline count, sets your maintenance.
Expect post-closing liquidity to be good but board-dependent. The resale record is deep. How easily you can sell later depends on the same board policies — financing, sublet and flip tax — that you should be collecting now.
What to know if you’re selling
Lead with elevator, landmark district and transit together. Very few Clinton Hill co-ops offer all three, and buyers comparing walk-ups on the side streets will not find them there.
Show the capital record. Repiping, the 2018 boiler and burner replacement, and the façade and roof work are the answers to the first questions a buyer's attorney will ask. Have the documentation ready.
Price against the building's own tiers. A combined or larger apartment is a different product from the building's one-bedroom inventory, and recent transfers show buyers pricing them that way.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering Francine Towers, also evaluate:
- 360 Clinton Avenue — a 1928 elevator co-op of 96 apartments in the same historic district; the closest prewar peer at larger scale
- Clinton Mews (372 DeKalb Avenue) — a 1930 building converted to co-op ownership in the late 1980s, a short walk east on the Pratt block
- 325 Clinton Avenue (Clinton Hill Apts. Owners Corp.) — the Clinton Hill cooperative campus; larger apartments in a garden-complex format
- 185 Hall Street (Willoughby Walk) — the 1958 postwar co-op tower nearby on Hall Street; more apartments, a different era
- 195 Willoughby Avenue (Willoughby Walk) — the sibling Willoughby Walk tower, a short walk away
- 147 South Oxford Street — a Fort Greene elevator co-op of 21 apartments; the small-building alternative
- 159 Lafayette Avenue — a Fort Greene Historic District co-op; the landmark-district contrast at boutique scale
- 122 Ashland Place (University Towers) — the large Fort Greene co-op tower; scale and service contrast
More Clinton Hill buildings
- 242 Greene Avenue (Shoe Factory Lofts) — 1930 condominium
- 252 Greene Avenue (Clinton Court) — 1890 condominium
- 275 Clinton Avenue (The Clinton) — 1897 co-op
- 320 Washington Avenue (The Graham) — 1851 condop
- 325 Clinton Avenue (Clinton Hill Apts. Owners Corp.) — 1945 co-op
- 335 Grand Avenue (Clinton Hill Condominium) — 1988 condominium
The neighborhood
For the full neighborhood — its buildings, character, and market — read The Roebling Team Guide to Clinton Hill.
The full playbook — what goes in the package, how boards read your financials, the interview, and the timeline — plus sample cover, reference, and personal letters you can adapt.
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. Where this page compares one building or neighborhood to another, that is our analysis of the recorded record — it names the measure, the period and the sample it rests on, and it is an observation about medians rather than a prediction about any particular apartment.
Considering a move at Francine Towers?
Request a private building brief with the relevant comparable sales, current and off-market availability, and an apartment-specific view of value.