470 Broome Street

Five stories on a fifty-by-one-hundred-foot corner lot, with rooftop additions above. The residential program is small and legible: two full-floor-plate lofts on the fourth floor, north and south, and two penthouses above them, each configured as a duplex with terraces created by the rooftop additions. Roughly 9,000 square feet of residential area across four apartments puts the units in the two-thousand-square-foot range before terrace area — genuine loft plates rather than subdivided ones, with two street exposures on a corner and the window rhythm of an 1867 warehouse.

The conversion re-established the exterior: a full façade restoration, window replacement across the second through fifth floors in 2006, and a new storefront infill approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission in 2005 within the existing masonry opening. The rooftop additions were approved by the Commission in 2007 as a certificate of no effect, which tells you they were set back and not visible from the street — the standard the district applies.

The north line is consolidating. A Department of Buildings NOW filing permitted in December 2025 covers the combination and renovation of apartments 4N and PH-N, including a new stair opening connecting the two floors. Recorded deeds show 4N and PHN in common ownership. If the combination completes, the building will hold three residential units rather than four — a meaningful change in a four-unit association, and one a buyer should factor into common-charge allocation and voting.

There is no doorman and no amenity program. The audited statements describe a bare operating budget: payroll and related expenses, utilities, water and sewer, repairs and maintenance, heating and air-conditioning maintenance, elevator maintenance, electrical repairs, security and alarm services, a management fee, professional fees and insurance. Insurance is the single largest line. The association capitalizes a resident manager's unit and personal property; everything else is owned by the unit owners in common.

The capital posture is the thing to underwrite. Total revenues and expenses each run a little over $200,000 a year, year-end cash sits near $105,000, members' equity is under $75,000, and there is no reserve fund and no reserve study. The auditor flags the missing supplementary information on future repairs and replacements; the notes confirm the governing documents do not require reserve accumulation. In a four-unit building sharing a landmarked 1867 masonry envelope with a large commercial component, that means a façade cycle, an elevator modernization or a roof event is funded by assessment, by borrowing, or by delay. Ask for the most recent financial statements, the current insurance certificate, the Local Law 11 façade status, and the commercial units' share of common expenses — and read the declaration for how costs are allocated between the residential and commercial sections.

Because the building is landmarked, exterior work runs through the Landmarks Preservation Commission, and the docket here is active: interior-alteration certificates through 2025, rooftop mechanical equipment approvals in 2025 and 2026, storefront awnings in 2026, and rope-access rear-façade inspections permitted in 2026.

The condominium holds a right of first refusal on both sales and leases, and the purchase application on file instructs applicants to protect themselves contractually against the board's exercise of it. That is the single most important transactional fact here: in a four-unit association, the right of first refusal is not a formality.

Beyond that, the package is a standard condominium submission — application, credit authorization, occupancy rider, executed contract, employment reference, tax returns, financing commitment where applicable, and a supported financial statement. A working capital contribution equal to one month of common charges is collected at each closing, along with application, credit-check and move-in and move-out fees and refundable deposits; the seller pays a closing fee at transfer.

Pet, sublet and pied-à-terre rules are not established in the documents we hold. As a condominium the building has no financing ceiling and no board interview, and subletting is ordinarily permitted subject to the right of first refusal — but confirm the current house rules with the managing agent in writing rather than assuming the condominium default.

Recent sales

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.

Market read. Most recent trades (2025) cleared a median $2,413/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 9.3% 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 1-00486-7502) 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.

Read the certificate of occupancy before anything else. No certificate for this building appears in the city's dataset, and the 2015 application to revise it was approved without sign-off. Establish the current legal occupancy of the specific unit you are buying, and whether the JLWQ designation is still on the certificate.

Underwrite the absence of reserves. A four-unit association with no reserve fund and no reserve study funds capital work by assessment. Price that.

Understand the commercial majority. Two-thirds of the building's square footage is commercial, separately owned and never offered for sale. Read the declaration for cost allocation, voting and the boundary between the residential and commercial sections.

Factor the right of first refusal. Your contract needs language protecting you if the board exercises it. The managing agent's own instructions say so.

Watch the north line. A permitted combination of 4N and PH-N would take the building to three residential units and reshuffle common interests.

If you're considering 470 Broome Street, also evaluate:

• 57 Greene Street — 1877 masonry warehouse converted to a fifteen-unit condominium in 2016, on the adjoining block; the closest architectural cousin
• 477 Broome Street — twenty-residence owner-occupied cooperative in an 1870s cast-iron loft directly across the street
• 43 Wooster Street — ten residences in an 1885 store-and-loft in the same district; the small-condominium comparison
• 105 Wooster Street — fifteen-residence loft condominium; boutique scale, similar policy framework
• 70 Greene Street — three-residence cast-iron loft condominium; the smallest-association comparison on the same street
• 22 Mercer Street — sixteen-residence condominium conversion of a mid-nineteenth-century loft
• 93 Greene Street (The Greene House) — 1881 Henry Fernbach cast-iron building converted in 1985; the earlier-conversion comparison
• 570 Broome Street — new-development condominium on the same street; the ground-up alternative
• 93 Mercer Street — ten half-floor lofts under JLWQ occupancy in cooperative form; the ownership-structure contrast