348 West 38th Street

The building fills a 75-by-99-foot lot. It has a concrete-and-steel frame, a stone and brick street front with glazed tile, and steel-framed windows on the north and south walls. The east and west lot-line windows are wire glass, which the plan kept. The conversion put in metal-stud partitions and hollow-metal doors, and the residential floors are fully sprinklered.

The plan offered 25 apartments across floors 7 through 13, delivered with kitchens and baths installed and with some interior partitioning left to buyers. Recorded transfers name apartments on floors 7 through 12 on A-to-E lines. Combinations have brought the count down to 21 per HPD, or 23 per the Department of Finance. Some apartments have balconies and some have skylights through the roof, per the house rules. Layouts vary by line and by how much each owner built out, so expect loft proportions rather than a standard floor plan.

Who runs what. The building owner runs the building. Under the master lease the owner makes structural repairs, supplies heat and hot water, and runs the freight elevator and commercial lobby with its own staff. A 1989 amendment gave the corporation exclusive control of the west lobby, the west entrance and the passenger elevator, plus roof access. The corporation now maintains those areas along with the windows and hallways on its floors. The corporation has its own managing agent, and the owner has a separate building manager.

The rent. Since the 1989 amendment, base rent has been $157,000 a year from 1991, plus 60 percent of the rise in the New York City Consumer Price Index measured from January 1990. The corporation also pays 60 percent of the building's real estate taxes from July 1991. Leasehold rent was about $290,000 in 2024, and the corporation's tax line was the largest single expense, per the audited statements on file.

Capital position. The corporation has no underlying mortgage. Cash at the end of 2024 was under $200,000, including a reserve account of about $73,000. The auditors note that no reserve study has been done and no funding plan exists for major replacements. The last two years closed with small operating losses. In 2024 the board levied a special assessment matched to shareholders' co-op tax abatement credits, which in effect sent the abatement toward operating costs. The most recent recorded capital item is a $42,808 entrance-door replacement in 2023.

Tax treatment. The 1979 plan warned that shareholders would not get the usual Section 216 deductions, because the corporation owned neither land nor building. The 1989 amendment later made the corporation directly responsible for its share of real estate taxes. Whether that changes deductibility today is a question for a tax adviser, not something this page can settle.

Zoning. The Midtown South Mixed-Use Plan, adopted in August 2025, removed the Special Garment Center District and brought this area into an expanded Special Hudson Yards District. PLUTO now maps the lot C6-4M. A September 2025 DOB filing for the building amends the ground-floor certificate of occupancy to retail, citing the change from manufacturing zoning. The residential floors date from the 1979 conversion and are not a Loft Law building. The plan states that no apartments were occupied and none were rent-regulated when offered. Buyers should pull the current certificate of occupancy for floors 7–13 during diligence.

Board application. The standard REBNY purchase application and financial statement, a contract, loan commitment if financing, two years of tax returns, references and an employment letter, plus a $500 processing fee and a $20 credit-check fee per applicant, per the application on file.

Flip tax. On a sliding scale: 5 percent within the first year, 3 percent in years two and three, 2 percent in year four, and 1 percent after that, with exceptions set out in the by-laws.

Subletting. The policy discourages it. The board approves sublets only in hardship cases, such as an owner temporarily relocated for work. An owner must have lived in the building for two years first. Each sublet runs six months, with no more than two years of sublets in any six-year period, a 20 percent monthly surcharge and a two-month deposit. If an apartment is not the owner's principal residence and someone else lives in it, the house rules treat it as a sublet.

Pets. Only with written board permission, which the board can revoke. Dogs must be carried or leashed in public areas.

Alterations. Board approval is required, and some work also needs the building owner's consent under the master lease. Contractors must carry $1 million in coverage naming the corporation, the owner and the managing agent. Sales will not be approved until the DOB record shows every permit for the apartment closed out.

Refinancing. Share loans need a new recognition agreement from the corporation and a board-reviewed refinance application.

Recent sales

Recent transfers at this building, from The Roebling Research Library. 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. $/sf is measured on the latest sales with reliable square footage (2023): a median $934/sf (recorded) across 2 sales. The building has traded as recently as 2026. Median listing discount 4.4% 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 1-00761-0059). Apartment-level facts (line, condition, asking-price context) curated and cross-verified in The Roebling Research Library. Not all transactions cross-verify with ACRIS records — sponsor and LLC purchases sometimes record at stipulated values rather than market price; square footage on co-ops is not officially recorded, figures shown are approximate.

Read the master lease and the 1989 amendment, not only the proprietary lease. They set the rent formula, the 60 percent tax share, who repairs what, and what the owner can rent the commercial floors for. The plan barred the owner from leasing to tenants that generate excessive noise, dirt or fumes.

Underwrite maintenance as rent plus taxes. Most of the budget cannot be controlled by the board. Model it rising with CPI and with the building's assessment, and take reserves and future assessments into account.

Confirm lender appetite early. A lease to 2179 easily clears lender term requirements, but leasehold co-ops inside commercial buildings narrow the pool of share lenders. Ask the managing agent which lenders have closed here recently.

Ask about the capital plan. No reserve study has been done and reserves are modest. Windows on the co-op floors are the corporation's responsibility, and window replacement in a loft building is expensive.

Lead with the build-out and the light. Loft volume on high floors, north and south exposures, and an exclusive residential lobby and elevator.

Address the structure before buyers raise it. Have the lease summary, the most recent financial statements and the maintenance history ready. Buyers' attorneys will find the leasehold on their own, and explaining it up front makes the deal easier.

Price the flip tax in. After four years of ownership it is 1 percent; before that it steps up sharply.

If you're considering 348 West 38th Street, also evaluate:

• 348 West 36th Street — a converted 1936 loft cooperative two blocks south, also west of Eighth Avenue
• 361 West 36th Street — a 1925 loft converted to a cooperative in 1981; the same generation of conversion
• 28 West 38th Street — a cooperative in a former commercial loft building on the east side of the Garment District
• 400 West 38th Street — VITA, a new-construction condominium at Ninth Avenue; the fee-simple alternative on the same street
• 430 West 34th Street — a 1963 cooperative in the Hudson Yards corridor
• 529 West 42nd Street — an early-1900s warehouse converted to loft residences on the far West Side
• 10 Bond Street — another leasehold cooperative on land the corporation does not own; useful for comparing how the structure prices