36 Hudson Street (Mohawk Atelier)

The two buildings are genuinely different and the LPC record says so. 36–38 Hudson Street, also addressed 163 Duane, was built in 1891–92 by Babcock & Morgan with L. N. Crow as builder, for Wood & Selick — Romanesque Revival, brick with cast iron. 161 Duane Street is half a century older, built in 1844–45, utilitarian with Greek Revival elements, brick and stone, and originally a converted dwelling. Joining them produced a condominium with two elevations, two structural vocabularies, and a plan that changes as it crosses the party wall. This is why residences carry addresses at both 36 Hudson Street and 161 Duane Street, and why floor plates differ materially between the A and B lines.

The corner is the building's most durable asset. Lot frontage of nearly 53 feet on Hudson with 91 feet of depth toward Duane gives the upper floors two street exposures rather than one, which in a low-rise historic district produces light that cannot easily be built out. Residences run two to a floor on the lower and middle stack, with 6AB as a full floor, 7A above and a penthouse duplex at the top. The 2013 combination of 6AB with 7A produced a very large upper-floor home that has traded as a single asset since.

The recorded schedule has twelve residential unit lots against a certificate of occupancy that carries eleven dwelling units. Both figures are correct in their own frame: 6A and 6B were offered and conveyed together as 6AB from the initial sellout, so the building has always sold as eleven homes. Buyers running automated analysis on this lot should note that PLUTO's eleven, the recorded twelve, and press coverage's twelve are all describing the same building.

Mohawk Atelier runs as a small boutique condominium — eleven residences and two commercial units at the base. That denominator is the operating fact. A building of this size cannot spread fixed cost the way a hundred-unit Tribeca condominium can, and it does not carry the amenity program that would justify trying. Common charges should be evaluated per square foot against the building's actual budget rather than against a service list.

The building has a documented capital history worth asking about. DOB filings record a heavy-duty sidewalk shed and pipe scaffold in 2012, followed by miscellaneous façade restoration under a 2012 alteration — a normal Local Law 11 cycle for a masonry-and-cast-iron pair of buildings from 1844 and 1891, and one that is now more than a decade old. A buyer should ask when the last façade cycle closed out, what the next one is expected to cost, and what the reserve position is against it.

The commercial base has turned over repeatedly and at scale. The two ground-floor units traded in 2006, twice in 2010, again in 2018, and again in 2022, at prices that have run well into eight figures across the pair. That churn matters to residential owners for two reasons: the commercial units carry a meaningful share of the common charge base, and the ground-floor tenancy — historically a restaurant with Group A-2 assembly occupancy — determines the noise, odour and delivery profile at the base of the building. Ask what the current use is and what the lease term looks like.

Ownership form: Condominium. Transfers close through a board right of first refusal rather than a cooperative board approval, which normally produces a 30-to-45-day closing timeline.

Pets, pied-à-terre, subletting, LLC, trust and foreign ownership: Condominium form does not settle these, and specific house rules for this building are not documented in public records; confirm them, including minimum sublease terms and any pet restrictions, in the current declaration, bylaws and house rules with the managing agent.

Flip tax / transfer fee: Not documented in public records. Confirm any resale capital contribution with the managing agent before pricing a sale.

Real estate taxes: The J-51 benefit is exhausted. The exemption component reads zero for fiscal 2027 in current Department of Finance exemption detail, and the abatement component expired after fiscal 2017. Underwrite full unabated taxes on the specific unit against the current bill, not against a projection or an older listing figure.

Certificate of occupancy: Temporary as of the most recent record on file, September 2022. Some lenders will not close against a TCO without additional comfort. Raise it with your lender at pre-approval rather than at commitment.

Recent sales

Recent closings 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. Most recent trades (2021) cleared a median $2,081/sf (floor-adjusted) across 3 sales. Floor-adjusted means each sale is restated to a constant mix of floors, so the figure can differ from the plain median of the sales listed above. Median listing discount 0.5% 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 1-00144-7502; each condominium apartment is its own tax lot). 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 from recorded condo declarations and offering plans.

Start with the certificate of occupancy. Alteration job 103605118 has run on successive temporary certificates from at least 2012 through September 2022 with no final CO in the record. Ask the managing agent for the current certificate, ask what open items are keeping it temporary, and ask your lender — in writing, before you are in contract — how it treats a TCO on a 2007 conversion.

Underwrite full taxes. The J-51 exemption reads zero for fiscal 2027. There is no step-up left to wait for and no benefit left to inherit. Run True Monthly Carrying Cost against the current bill for the specific unit.

Know which of the two buildings your apartment is in. 36–38 Hudson dates to 1891–92; 161 Duane dates to 1844–45. They have different structures, different floor geometry and different exposures. The deed address tells you which one you are buying.

Ignore PLUTO's 1910. The LPC building database records 1891–92 and 1844–45 for the two structures on this lot. Any analysis keyed to a 1910 build year — including automated valuation output — is working from a wrong input.

Ask about the façade cycle and the reserve. The last documented Local Law 11 work at this building was in 2012. The condominium includes residential and commercial units; the declaration allocates façade costs by common interest and any specific expense provisions, rather than an equal split among eleven residences. Get three years of financials, the current budget and the reserve balance.

Ask what is in the ground floor now. The base was a restaurant with assembly occupancy for a decade and the commercial units have traded repeatedly. Current use, current lease term and the building's rules on ground-floor operations are worth knowing before contract, not after.

Get ahead of the certificate of occupancy. The record described here contains temporary certificates through September 2022. Obtain the current certificate, the status of any open items and the lender's requirements before listing; the record does not establish a typical delay or guarantee that early paperwork resolves it.

Present the tax number, not the old one. Listing history and comparables from the J-51 period may show a lower tax line than the current bill. Leading with the current bill for the apartment and the True Monthly Carrying Cost analysis produces better outcomes than letting a buyer discover the change in diligence. If your bill carries an owner-specific benefit, such as the cooperative and condominium abatement, say so: it depends on the owner's own eligibility.

Lead with the corner and the provenance. Two street exposures on a landmarked Tribeca corner half a block from Duane Park, in a conversion by a preservation architect, with a documented restaurant history at the base, is a specific story that the generic Tribeca loft inventory cannot tell.

Same-building comparables are thin and uneven. Eleven residences, two source buildings, one large combined home at the top: pricing here has to be built line by line and floor by floor, not from a building average.

If you're considering Mohawk Atelier, also evaluate:

• 1 Hudson Street — separate Tribeca loft building on a nearby lot; the closest same-street alternative, and a different declaration entirely
• 16 Hudson Street — small Tribeca conversion a few doors south; comparable denominator
• 108 Duane Street — Duane Street loft conversion of similar scale
• 134 Duane Street — boutique Duane Street condominium; the closest peer by unit count and vintage of conversion
• 137 Duane Street — Duane Street loft building; comparable plate and exposure
• 166 Duane Street — small Duane Street conversion near Duane Park
• 84 Hudson Street — Hudson Street loft condominium at a similar tier
• 47 Hudson Street — nearby Tribeca loft alternative with a different service model
• 52 Thomas Street — landmarked Tribeca loft conversion with full-floor residences
• 145 Hudson Street — the larger, more serviced Hudson Street condominium alternative