- Year built
- 1907
- Type
- Condominium
- Units
- 1101
- Floors
- 10
- Landmark
- No
- Pets
- Not documented in the records available to us — confirm with the managing agent
Every recorded sale at this building, 2005–2024
Price-per-square-foot over time, the line- and floor-premium curves, and every recorded sale.
- Median $/sf
- $816
- Listing discount
- 6.8%
- Recorded sales
- 9
- On record
- 2005–2024
Eight apartments in a ten-story 1907 loft building is the entire proposition. Each residence is a full floor of roughly 3,500 square feet on a 40-by-100 lot, with light on the avenue and on the rear, and the building has no doorman, no amenity program and no shared corridors to speak of. Buyers who want a private-floor loft at Chelsea's northern edge without a new-development price and without cooperative board approval have a very short list, and this is on it.
The building's history is the more interesting half, and it is unusually well documented because the offering plan survives. Through the 1970s the loft floors filled with residential tenants in a manufacturing district where residential use was not permitted. In 1982, on the passage of Article 7-C — the Loft Law — the building became an interim multiple dwelling, and its owner registered it with the New York City Loft Board in 1983. When the sponsor bought the property in April 1998 and filed a conversion plan the following year, the third, fourth, fifth, sixth and tenth floors and the penthouse were occupied by tenants protected under Article 7-C. Those rights were purchased through buy-out agreements filed with the Loft Board, and in two cases the sponsor obtained Loft Board determinations that the units had been abandoned, which carries the same legal effect. Those floors were grandfathered for residential use under §281(4) of the Multiple Dwelling Law and could convert without further zoning relief.
The rear half of the seventh floor and the whole of the eighth and ninth floors had no prior residential occupancy and could not be grandfathered. In an M1-6 district, they could not lawfully become apartments without a use variance. So the plan offered five residences immediately and made three conditional on the Board of Standards and Appeals granting a variance, with the plain warning that no guarantee could be given. The variance path resolved: all eight residential unit lots were later carrying J-51 benefits and are recorded as residential in Department of Finance data, and the units transferred to separate buyers.
The zoning that made all of that necessary is gone. In August 2025 the City Council adopted the Midtown South Mixed-Use Plan, replacing the manufacturing districts across this part of Midtown South with the Special Midtown South Mixed-Use District. This lot is now mapped M1-8A/R11 with Mandatory Inclusionary Housing. Residential use here is now as of right — a quarter century after the sponsor had to litigate the point at the BSA. For an owner, that matters less as history than as context for what gets built on the neighboring lots.
Architecture and unit composition
The building is a ten-story-plus-penthouse loft of 1907, with a two-story stone base beneath a beige brick shaft that has been patched over the decades, a heavy bandcourse above the eighth floor and a lighter one above the second. It is a working loft elevation rather than a designed apartment-house facade, and the sidewalk-shed and parapet repair history in the Department of Buildings file — remedial work in 2000, 2007 and 2008, steel repairs to the water-tank dunnage in 2009, penthouse roof work in 2015 — is the maintenance record of a masonry loft carrying its second century.
Residences are full floors. Roughly 28,300 square feet of residential area across eight units gives an average approaching 3,500 square feet, with light on two long exposures and, in several units, fireplaces. The penthouse duplex occupies the top of the stack; the offering plan provided for a roof deck built out to the maximum area permitted, maintained by the penthouse owner. The lower floors and the cellar hold the four commercial units, which include retail on Seventh Avenue and storage below.
The commercial component is not incidental. Four of twelve unit lots and roughly 8,100 square feet of the building's 36,400 are commercial. Buyers should understand that this is a mixed-use condominium in which commercial owners hold real voting weight and real common-charge obligation, and that lenders assess commercial-area ratios when they underwrite a mortgage in a building like this.
Building operations
There is no resident staff. The offering plan provided for a visiting superintendent with an office and bathroom in the cellar, and garbage chutes accessed from within each residential unit — a design choice that follows directly from having one apartment per floor. Common charges reflect that: the condominium's audited statements show a small operating budget carried by twelve units, with no payroll for a doorman or a resident manager.
Capital posture in a building this size is assessment-driven. The condominium's audited financial statements on file record a $100,000 special assessment imposed in October 2015 to fund a new boiler system, billed from December 2015 through April 2016 and then maintained through 2016 in lieu of a common-charge increase. The auditors noted that the condominium has not commissioned a study of the remaining useful lives of the common property and has no funding plan for future major repairs, and that when funds are required the board expects to levy special assessments. That is normal for a twelve-unit building and it is exactly why a buyer here should ask for the most recent financial statements and the minutes rather than relying on the common charge alone. The statements on file with us are several years old; obtain current ones.
Policy framework
Ownership form: Condominium. No board approval, no interview, no financing ceiling — but the condominium board holds a right of first refusal on any sale or lease, and can match a bona fide offer. In an eight-residence building, that provision has teeth and should be understood before a contract is signed.
Pied-à-terre, subletting, LLC, trust and foreign ownership: All permitted under the standard condominium framework, subject to the right of first refusal on leases.
Pets: Not documented in the records available to us. Confirm with the managing agent.
Flip tax: None documented. The working capital contribution at the initial closings was $1,500 per purchaser; confirm what, if anything, applies on resale.
Real estate taxes: No abatement. The J-51 benefit that ran from 2004 has expired. Underwrite the current full tax bill on the specific unit — this is the most common carrying-cost error in older converted lofts, where buyers anchor on a historic tax line.
Local Law 97
- 2024–2029 annual penalty
- $419/yr
- 2030–2034 annual penalty
- $28,540/yr
- Per unit / month range
- $4 – $297
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 2005–10 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 building trades as boutique full-floor loft product on the Chelsea–Midtown South seam. With eight residences and a sellout that ran from 2000 into 2002, same-building comparables are thin by construction — resale volume across the entire building has averaged well under one trade a year since conversion. Pricing is therefore established by the Chelsea and Flatiron full-floor loft set rather than by an internal average, and it moves with renovation condition more than with floor.
Indexed to the last complete year, Chelsea loft condominiums price on a dollars-per-square-foot basis that sits below new-development inventory on the same avenues and above prewar cooperative product of comparable size. The absence of a tax abatement and the absence of amenity payroll pull in opposite directions on the monthly number, and the net result should be modeled on the specific unit. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 17, 2024 | 3 | 2 BR · 2 BA · 3,370 sf | $2,750,000 | $816/sf | -6.8% |
| Sep 6, 2023 | 5 | 3 BR · 2.5 BA · 3,370 sf | $3,830,000 | $1,136/sf | -6.6% |
| Nov 4, 2022 | 7 | 3,370 sf | $3,650,000 | $1,083/sf | off-mkt |
| Sep 10, 2021 | 8 | 3 BR · 2.5 BA · 3,370 sf | $3,850,000 | $1,142/sf | -10.4% |
| Nov 30, 2015 | 4 | 2 BR · 3,370 sf | $3,750,000 | $1,113/sf | -6.3% |
| Jan 31, 2014 | PH10 | 5 BR · 4,900 sf | $4,600,000 | $939/sf | -7.1% |
| Apr 15, 2011 | 4 | 1 BR · 3,370 sf | $3,250,000 | $964/sf | off-mkt |
| Dec 23, 2005 | CELL | 1,686 sf | $4,200,000 | $2,491/sf | off-mkt |
Market read. Most recent trades (2024) cleared a median $816/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 6.8% 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 1-00802-7502) 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
Read the right of first refusal clause. It applies to leases as well as sales. If your plan involves renting the apartment, resolve the mechanics and the notice period with the managing agent and your attorney before contract.
This is a mixed-use condominium with four commercial units. Ask for the common-interest schedule, the commercial owners' arrears history, and how the board is constituted. Some lenders apply commercial-area limits that can complicate financing.
Underwrite assessments, not common charges. A twelve-unit building with no reserve study funds capital work by assessment. Ask what has been assessed in the last five years and what the board expects next — the facade and the roof are the obvious candidates in a 1907 masonry loft.
Full-floor living is different. One apartment per floor means the elevator opens into your home and there are no neighbors on your level. It also means no interior corridor, no package room and no staff. Walk the building at night before deciding.
The tax abatement is gone. Model the full unabated number, not a historical bill. Run the True Monthly Carrying Cost Calculator against the current statement.
What to know if you’re selling
Sell the floor plate. Roughly 3,500 square feet of full-floor loft with two exposures is the product. Comparables should be drawn from Chelsea and Flatiron loft conversions of similar format, not from the smaller-unit condominium inventory on the avenue.
Get ahead of the diligence questions. The commercial units, the right of first refusal and the absence of a reserve study will all come up. Answering them with the condominium's own documents up front removes the friction; letting a buyer's attorney find them creates it.
Condominium liquidity is your advantage. No board package, no interview, no financing ceiling. In a market where cooperative approval risk is priced in, say so plainly in the marketing.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 291 Seventh Avenue, also evaluate:
- 144 West 27th Street — loft condominium on the same tax block; the closest comparable by vintage and format
- 146 West 26th Street — Chelsea loft conversion one block south; similar plate, different policy stack
- 128 West 26th Street — prewar loft building on the same corridor
- 250 West 27th Street — larger Chelsea loft building; more units, more staff, different economics
- 233 West 26th Street — Chelsea conversion at smaller scale
- 245 Seventh Avenue — condominium on the same avenue to the south
- 252 Seventh Avenue — full-service Chelsea condominium; the amenity alternative
- 315 Seventh Avenue — Seventh Avenue conversion to the north
- 121 West 19th Street — Chelsea loft condominium further south; larger building, comparable product
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.
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