40 Clinton Street (Clinton Towers)
40 Clinton Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
BBL 3002380065 · BIN 3001936
- Year built
- 1964
- Type
- Cooperative
- Units
- 153
- Floors
- 11
- Landmark
- No
- Flip tax
- Not documented in the materials reviewed; confirm at offer stage
- Subletting
- Board approval required; one-year terms; max five years total per shareholder; 20% of monthly maintenance sublet fee; short-term/Airbnb strictly prohibited
- Washer / dryer
- Prohibited; grandfathered machines must be removed at sale and may not be replaced
- Pets
- Up to two pets (dogs/cats), 40 lb cap, breed restrictions (pit bull, Rottweiler, Cane Corso types and related); no pets for subtenants
Compiled by The Roebling Research Desk from the building’s offering plan, amendments, and related building documents (primary source dated 2020). Reported and subject to confirmation. Board policies can change by amendment — confirm at the offer stage.
Clinton Towers is one of the workhorse cooperatives of Brooklyn Heights — a 1964 elevator building of roughly 150 apartments that delivers what the neighborhood's landmarked row-house core structurally cannot: doorman service, an indoor garage, elevator convenience, and postwar apartment layouts, all a short walk from Borough Hall's transit cluster. The building went up in the narrow window before the Brooklyn Heights Historic District's November 1965 designation froze the neighborhood's fabric, and its parcel sits just outside the district boundary. That timing explains both its scale — eleven stories with setbacks rising to a penthouse level, unrepeatable under the district's controls — and its role in the market as the Heights' high-capacity alternative to walk-up brownstone ownership.
The building's physical program is more generous than its plain postwar elevation suggests. The offering plan's engineering report describes a large rear yard running the full length of the western face — actually the planted roof deck of the 50-car garage below — with seven private terraces serving the rear garden-line apartments. The massing steps back progressively from the ninth floor, producing terrace setbacks at the upper floors, and the sub-cellar carries the co-op's utility spine: laundry, storage, and workshop space. The indoor garage, operated under a long-term lease with resident priority written into its terms, remains one of the scarcest amenities in the Heights, where off-street parking is nearly nonexistent inside the historic district.
The cooperative conversion followed the classic mid-1980s Brooklyn pattern. Sponsor Clinton Tower Associates presented the plan on October 30, 1985 as a non-eviction conversion — 15,714 shares across 150 offered apartments, at a total cash offering of roughly $18.9 million — with the plan expressly prohibited from ever being amended into an eviction plan. Tenants in occupancy held a 90-day exclusive purchase window, non-purchasing tenants (including rent-stabilized garage tenants) kept their protections, and the building has operated as Clinton Towers Apt. Corp. since. Four decades on, the shareholder base has turned over into a conventional owner-occupied Heights co-op, but the plan's tenant-protective origins still surface occasionally in diligence — a reminder to review the current sponsor/investor share position, if any, during contract review.
For buyers priced out of the district's small prewar co-ops or seeking services those buildings lack, Clinton Towers is consistently on the short list. Its scale supports a real staff and real amenities at maintenance levels that benefit from 150-plus units sharing the load, and its location puts the 2/3/4/5/R trains at Borough Hall, Cadman Plaza's green, and the Montague Street retail spine all within a few minutes' walk.
Architecture and unit composition
The building is an eleven-story structure of irregular footprint with a penthouse level, a basement level of eleven apartments plus the professional office, and typical floors of fourteen apartments (floors one through eight), narrowing to ten apartments on nine and ten and nine at the penthouse as the setbacks bite. The unit mix runs from studios and one-bedrooms through the larger combined and penthouse-line apartments; the seven rear garden-line units carry private terraces onto the garage-roof yard, and upper-floor setback units gain terraces from the massing steps. Two passenger elevators serve cellar through penthouse.
Apartment interiors follow the 1964 postwar idiom — efficient foyer entries, windowed kitchens and baths in many lines, and solid concrete-frame construction between floors. The co-op owns and maintains the central heating and air-conditioning plant, an unusual convenience for the era and the neighborhood: apartments draw on building HVAC rather than individual window or through-wall condensers, and the house rules regulate access for riser maintenance accordingly. Combinations have been common over the decades given the fourteen-unit floorplates; layouts should be verified unit by unit against the offering plan's share schedule.
Building operations
Clinton Towers operates as a full-service cooperative. The staffing model at conversion — superintendent, two doormen, two porters, and a handyman — established the service pattern that continues today, with door coverage, a live-in super, and a managed package and laundry operation (the laundry room is open at all hours under the house rules). The garage seats 50 cars under an operator lease whose terms require resident priority, uniformed attendants, and operator responsibility for repairs; garage tenancy predating the conversion carried rent-stabilized protections for non-purchasing tenants. The roof deck is a house amenity, subject to board rules.
Governance runs through Clinton Towers Apt. Corp.'s board, which enforces a detailed and actively updated house-rule regime — the current rules cover everything from smoking (building-wide common-area ban) to renovation hours, insurance minimums ($500,000 liability), a $50 late fee after the 15th, and a graduated fine schedule for violations. Board oversight extends to refinancing: shareholders financing or refinancing must submit an application for board review, a control worth flagging to lenders early.
Recent sales
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Oct 15, 2025 | 4C | $502,000 |
| Oct 14, 2025 | 1E | $525,000 |
| Jun 26, 2025 | 7E | $585,000 |
| Apr 15, 2025 | 8L | $600,000 |
| Dec 10, 2024 | 8M | $530,000 |
| May 24, 2024 | 7J | $590,000 |
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-00238-0065) 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.
What to know if you’re buying
This is the services play in the Heights. Doorman, live-in super, central air, garage, roof deck — the amenity set is the point. Price the maintenance against the services actually delivered, and compare honestly with what a no-staff prewar co-op would cost you monthly after adding parking and window units.
The garage has a waiting dynamic. Fifty spaces serve 150-plus apartments with resident priority; ask about current availability and cost before assuming a space conveys with your purchase, because it does not.
Sublet policy is defined and finite. One-year terms, five-year lifetime cap, 20 percent maintenance surcharge. If you may need long-term rental flexibility, a condominium is the better instrument.
No in-unit laundry — permanently. The washer/dryer prohibition includes a no-replacement rule for grandfathered machines. The central laundry is the trade.
Confirm financing and transfer-fee terms early. Board financing requirements and any flip tax are not in the public record; have your agent confirm the current application package before offer.
What to know if you’re selling
Market against the district's co-ops on services and convenience. Your buyer is choosing between charm and function; sell the doorman, the central air, the garage priority, and the Borough Hall transit cluster explicitly.
Terrace and setback units deserve their own comparable set. The garden-line terraces over the rear yard and the ninth-floor-and-up setback terraces are scarce features; do not let per-room building averages anchor their pricing.
Prepare the board package for a policy-heavy building. The house rules are detailed and enforced; a clean, complete application with the insurance certificate and alteration history moves faster.
Disclose the washer/dryer rule to buyers with machines in mind. It is a deal-shaping fact and better surfaced at the listing stage.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 40 Clinton Street, also evaluate:
- 75 Henry Street — the Heights' largest postwar co-op; the closest peer in scale and services
- 77 Livingston Street — prewar elevator co-op on the Borough Hall side of the neighborhood
- 130 Clinton Street — smaller Clinton Street prewar co-op alternative in the district proper
- 57 Montague Street (The Breukelen) — prewar Montague Street co-op with doorman service
- 135 Willow Street — the postwar co-op alternative inside the historic district, with garage
- 145 Hicks Street (The Mansion House) — prewar mid-scale co-op in the district's core
- 100 Remsen Street — mid-size prewar co-op south of Montague
- 44 Pineapple Street — large north-Heights co-op comparable
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.
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