495 West Street

The lot is 67 feet on West Street and 80 feet deep — a small parcel, which is why the building goes to eleven stories on 30,000-odd square feet of residential area and why the floor plates are single-residence. The western wall is the design event: continuous horizontal steel window bands facing the Hudson, uninterrupted across the full width of each home. The brick is laid in alternating corbelled courses that give the elevation a horizontal reading at odds with the vertical glass towers to the north, and the concrete frame is expressed rather than concealed inside the residences.

The stack, per the recorded unit-lot schedule, runs a ground-floor residence at roughly 1,988 square feet, full-floor homes on floors two through seven, and two duplex penthouses above. The penthouse duplexes are the only homes with private outdoor space of consequence; a pergola was permitted on the west terrace in 2006, and the rear yard was rebuilt with a deck, trellis and bluestone patio under a 2019 application.

Envelope work has been a recurring theme rather than a single project. The condominium filed facade repairs in 2008, work to insulate and parge the newly exposed south wall in 2010, brick replacement and resealing of parapet caps, relieving-angle joints and windows in 2012, and a full facade restoration in 2016 with sidewalk shed and scaffold; completion and current condition need confirming. That is a normal history for a masonry building on an unprotected river-facing elevation, and it is also a warning: this facade takes weather that a mid-block building does not.

Nine residences, an attended lobby with 24-hour doorman coverage, a key-locked elevator with direct entry into each home, and a laundry room. There is no gym, no garage and no amenity program. The trade is service and privacy at a very small scale, funded by nine unit owners.

Two live items belong in any current underwriting:

Facade. Under Local Law 11, the building filed Safe in Cycles 7 and 8 and Safe With a Repair and Maintenance Program in Cycle 9, submitted March 2023. A SWARMP report sets its own repair completion date, one to five years after filing; the repairs are due by that date, not by the end of the cycle. Ask for the report and its completion date.

Active exterior work. A permit was issued in April 2026 for exterior repairs at all elevations, and a sidewalk shed and pipe scaffold permit was issued in August 2026. The permits point to a capital project on a nine-unit denominator; confirm its status. Ask for the scope, the contract sum, the funding source, and whether an assessment has been levied or is contemplated.

Certificate of occupancy housekeeping. A no-work Alteration Type 1 application filed by the condominium in 2023 changes the occupancy classification from J-2 under the 1968 code to R-2 under the current code, with no change in unit count. The permit was issued and the job was active into 2024. This is administrative rather than substantive, but confirm it has been closed out.

Ownership form: Condominium. Purchases close through a board right of first refusal rather than a cooperative approval, which produces a faster and more predictable timetable — 30 to 45 days is typical.

Pied-à-terre, subletting, LLC, trust and foreign ownership: Pied-à-terre use and leasing by owners are permitted; confirm LLC, trust and foreign ownership, and minimum lease terms, in the current declaration, bylaws and house rules with the managing agent.

Pets: Not documented in public records. Confirm the house rules before contract.

Flip tax: Not documented in public records. Confirm any resale capital contribution before pricing a sale.

Real estate taxes: No exemption of any kind appears on the residential unit lots in the current assessment roll; check the unit's current bill for any abatement and underwrite against it.

Insurance: The property sits in a special flood hazard area. Obtain a flood insurance quote early — for a nine-unit building, the master policy and its cost allocation are a meaningful share of common charges.

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 (2026 to date) cleared a median $4,170/sf (recorded) across 1 sale. Median listing discount 5.9% 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 1-00641-7502; 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.

Look at the vacant lot to the south. 489 West Street is carried as vacant land in the current assessment roll. Understand what the zoning permits there and which windows in your specific unit face it.

Underwrite the facade project. Cycle 9 was filed SWARMP in 2023, exterior repair permits were issued in 2026, and a shed permit followed; confirm the work's status and scope. On nine units, a facade job is a per-owner number, not a rounding error.

Price the flood exposure. Special flood hazard area status affects insurance, lending in some cases, and the treatment of cellar-level mechanicals. Get a quote before you go to contract.

Expect condition variance. Homes were delivered raw. Two units on adjacent floors may be twenty years apart in build quality. Inspect, and do not price off a building average.

Ask about the reserve. A nine-unit condominium with an exposed river-facing masonry envelope and a recurring facade obligation needs a reserve that is large relative to its size. Read the balance sheet.

Sell the floor, not the finishes. An entire floor with a continuous ribbon of Hudson River window and a private elevator landing is the scarce thing. Finishes can be replaced; the plate and the exposure cannot.

Get ahead of the facade work. A sidewalk shed on the building at the time of showings is a price argument for a buyer unless you have the scope, cost and funding plan in hand.

Position against the waterfront set, not the West Village generally. The comparable buildings are the river-facing condominiums a few blocks in either direction, whose economics and buyer pool are different from the brownstone-block inventory inland.

Document your build-out. Because the sponsor delivered raw space, document the work completed in the specific residence and compare its present condition with recent sales.

If you're considering 495 West Street, also evaluate:

• 165 Charles Street — Richard Meier's Hudson-facing condominium a few blocks south; the glass alternative on the same waterfront
• 173 Perry Street — the Meier Perry Street towers; full-floor river-facing residences at similar scale
• 150 Charles Street — the large full-amenity waterfront condominium; the opposite end of the service spectrum
• 433 West Street — former factory complex on the same waterfront strip; the loft-conversion alternative
• 290 West Street — West Street condominium south of Canal; comparable river frontage in a different submarket
• 100 Bank Street — West Village building one block inland; the non-waterfront alternative
• 302 West 12th Street — full-service West Village building on the adjacent block
• 31 Jane Street — Jane Street cooperative; the prewar West Village alternative with different financing and policy rules
• 250 West Street — Tribeca loft conversion with river outlooks; the larger-building comparison
• 155 Perry Street — boutique Perry Street condominium; the small-building alternative inland