42 Ann Street (Keuffel & Esser Company Building)

The building is a fireproof steel-and-cast-iron-framed structure roughly twenty-five feet wide, running the full block depth from Fulton Street through to Ann Street. That geometry produces the layouts: each residence occupies an entire floor and takes light from both ends, with the long middle of the plate depending on ceiling volume rather than glass. The barrel-vaulted ceilings — described in listing records at approximately thirteen and a half feet — are what make that middle work.

The two elevations are not equivalent. Fulton Street is the show façade, with the intact cast-iron storefront and the terra-cotta upper stories. Ann Street is the working elevation: buff brick, cast-iron base, brick piers, a corbeled cornice, a fire escape running the full height, and the surviving painted Keuffel & Esser advertisement on the west wall. The Ann Street portion is one story taller than the Fulton Street portion, which is why city records show ten floors against the Commission's eight-story description of the primary façade, and why a duplex residence occupies the ninth and tenth levels.

The commercial unit at the base is condominium lot 1008 and trades separately from the residences. Deeded storage conveys with the apartments.

This is a seven-residence building with a virtual doorman and no staffed lobby. Bicycle racks and deeded storage are the amenity program. Fixed costs — elevator, water tank, heat, insurance, façade compliance — are spread across seven residential owners and one commercial owner, which makes the common charge per foot sensitive to any single capital item.

The building has run a normal maintenance cycle in public view, including a 2014 water-tank and steel-dunnage replacement filed while the condominium was being created, a 2015 sidewalk-shed installation, and a 2016 filing covering façade work alongside an interior renovation of the ninth-and-tenth-floor duplex.

The capital question specific to this building is Landmarks. Every exterior element that matters here — the cast-iron storefront, the terra-cotta banding, the balustrade, the 1897 rooftop penthouse, the painted advertisement on the Ann Street wall — is regulated. Restoration of historic fabric is more expensive than replacement and slower to permit. A buyer should ask the managing agent for the current reserve position, any assessment history, the façade filing status, and whether any LPC permit or violation is open.

The building's residential conversion was carried out under 421-g, the Lower Manhattan office-to-residential program, and the listing record for the building has for years advertised that benefit. As of the current tax year it is gone, in both of its components.

The 421-g exemption appears on the Department of Finance rolls for the residential unit lots under exemption code 1925, with a benefit start of 2011 and a thirteen-year term. The exempt value declines across the fiscal 2021, 2022 and 2023 rolls and reaches zero on the fiscal 2024 roll.

The 421-g abatement is recorded separately in DOF's abatement detail for the same unit lots under program code 421G, with a benefit period running July 1, 2010 through June 30, 2025. It expired at the end of that period.

Both benefits have therefore run their course. Any listing, valuation or spreadsheet that still credits this building with a 421-g benefit is working from stale information, and the difference between an abated and an unabated monthly number on a 2,700-square-foot Financial District residence is not small. Underwrite the current bill on the specific unit.

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 (2024) cleared a median $1,063/sf (recorded) across 3 sales. Median listing discount 3.1% 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 1-00091-7503; 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.

Verify the tax bill yourself. 421-g is expired on both the exemption and the abatement side. Do not accept a marketing sheet that references it.

The exterior is regulated. Individual landmark designation means windows, storefront, signage and visible rooftop work require LPC review. Ask what is currently permitted, what is open, and what the condominium's façade plan looks like over the next five years.

Seven owners is a small denominator. One elevator modernization or one façade cycle lands hard. Read the budget, the reserve and the assessment history before contract.

Confirm the address in your title and lender file. The building answers to both 42 Ann Street and 127 Fulton Street. Mismatched addresses across a title report, an appraisal and a tax record slow closings.

Understand the two conversions. The residential conversion (2009–11) and the condominium creation (2014–15) were separate events under separate owners. Whether any construction warranty or sponsor obligation runs from the 2014–15 offering or the earlier work is for counsel to establish from the offering plan.

Walk the floor plate. Twenty-five feet wide and a hundred and eighteen feet deep is a specific kind of living. The vaulted ceilings carry the middle of the plan; see it in person before deciding whether it works for you.

Lead with the landmark, and document it. The LPC designation report is a public document that tells this building's story better than any listing copy could. Provide it.

Get ahead of the tax question. Buyers who discover the 421-g expiry in diligence will reprice. Buyers who are given the current bill up front, with a carrying-cost analysis attached, will not.

Price against full-floor landmark conversions, not against serviced condominiums. The comparable set is the Fulton corridor's loft conversions, adjusted for the amenity gap in both directions.

Prepare the Landmarks answer. Every serious buyer's attorney will ask what exterior work is pending and what it will cost. Have the condominium's position ready.

If you're considering 42 Ann Street, also evaluate:

• 130 Fulton Street — the Fulton Building, also De Lemos & Cordes and also 1891–93, directly across Fulton Street; the same architects and vintage in a 21-unit boutique loft condominium
• 111 Fulton Street — late Art Deco commercial building converted to loft-scale condominium residences; the larger Fulton-corridor alternative
• 119 Fulton Street (Fultonhaus) — 1919 building converted to condominium a few doors east; comparable boutique scale
• 150 Nassau Street — R. H. Robertson's 1894–95 early skyscraper, converted to condominium in 2002; the closest peer in vintage and architectural significance
• 71 Nassau Street — 1905 Beaux-Arts office building converted to condominium in the mid-2000s; similar conversion economics at larger scale
• 65 Nassau Street — circa-1898 loft building converted to residential cooperative use in 1980; the co-op alternative in the same corridor
• 80 John Street — Buchman & Kahn, 1926–27, condominium-converted in 2006; the full-service alternative two blocks south
• 99 John Street — 1933 building, rental conversion 1999 and condominium conversion 2007; the large-building comparison for amenities and staffing
• 5 Beekman Street — Temple Court, 1883, with a 2016 tower; the landmark-plus-new-construction alternative at a different price tier
• 176 Broadway — 1927 prewar cooperative; the co-op comparison for carrying cost and policy