- Year built
- 1931
- Type
- Cooperative
- Units
- 18
- Floors
- 18
- Landmark
- Designated
- Financing
- Not permitted — 100% cash purchases only
- Flip tax
- 3% of purchase price, buyer-paid, at closing
- Subletting
- Not permitted — an owner-occupancy building.
- Pied-à-terre
- Not permitted.
- Pets
- Permitted, subject to Board approval.
- Co-purchasing
- Permitted. Parents purchasing for children not permitted.
- Guarantors
- Not permitted.
Compiled by The Roebling Research Desk from building documents and current market data. Board policies can change by amendment — confirm at the offer stage. As of 2026.
778 Park Avenue is one of the most architecturally distinguished Candela buildings on Park Avenue and one of the few pre-World War II Park Avenue towers to rise above the avenue's general 15-story height ceiling. Rosario Candela designed it in 1931 for the developer Charles Newmark as an 18-story limestone-and-brick composition organized around a single defining premise: one apartment per floor. Where contemporary Candela commissions on Park Avenue (740 Park, 770 Park, 720 Park) accommodated multiple apartments per floor, 778 Park's full-floor configuration places it in a particular subset of Manhattan pre-war inventory — buildings where the apartment is the floor.
The architectural and operational consequences are substantial. Each of the 18 apartments occupies an entire floor plate; many include private terraces; all enjoy multiple exposures; the elevators open into private vestibules within each apartment. The result is an apartment experience closer to a horizontal mansion than a typical pre-war Manhattan apartment — a configuration shared by only a handful of Manhattan buildings (820 Fifth, [1 Sutton Place South](/buildings/1-sutton-place-south), certain Candela Park Avenue peers).
The building's resident roster across its 95-year history has included a cross-section of New York's institutional cultural and financial leadership. Brooke Astor — the philanthropist whose Vincent Astor Foundation work shaped American philanthropy through the second half of the 20th century — lived in a 14-room duplex spanning the 15th and 16th floors until her death in 2007. The Astor apartment was on the market for more than three years following her death and eventually sold for $21 million. Lawrence Herbert, the founder of Pantone, listed his full-floor 11th-floor apartment for $39.5 million.
For buyers, 778 Park represents a particular Park Avenue tier: institutionally exclusive, architecturally distinguished, structurally configured around the single-floor-per-apartment premise that makes it different from 740 Park or 770 Park's larger inventories. The board exercises selectivity calibrated to the building's identity.
Architecture and unit composition
The 18 full-floor apartments range in size and configuration, with all units occupying approximately the same floor plate but reflecting the renovation history of each apartment. Pre-war Candela signatures throughout: 11–12 foot ceilings in primary rooms, formal entry galleries leading from the elevator vestibule, library-living-room combinations, formal dining rooms, primary suites with extensive closet and dressing infrastructure, and service wings.
Many apartments include private terraces — a feature that becomes especially prominent on the upper floors, where the building's setbacks produce substantial outdoor space directly accessible from the apartment.
The full-floor configuration with elevator-vestibule access produces apartment privacy that exceeds most Manhattan pre-war buildings. Each apartment is effectively its own residential floor, with no shared landing or stair circulation to neighbors. This affects daily-life experience materially.
Building operations
778 Park operates as a full-service pre-war cooperative with full-time doorman, attended elevator, on-site superintendent, and private storage. Property management is handled by the managing agent (account executives Thomas Usztoke and Antonella Piecora).
The building's policy block is strict. The combination of restrictions — financing not permitted, trusts not allowed (explicit), no subletting, no short-term rentals, no Airbnb, no pied-à-terre, no corporate purchases, no diplomat purchases, no parents-for-children purchases, no guarantors — produces a screening framework calibrated to a narrow buyer profile: cash buyers acquiring as individuals for primary residence in their own name.
Local Law 97
- 2024–2029 annual penalty
- $0 (under cap)
- 2030–2034 annual penalty
- $81,159/yr
- Per unit / month range
- $0 – $376
Recent sales
778 Park Avenue is a tier-one Rosario Candela 1931 cooperative where annual recorded turnover typically runs to 1–2 arms-length closings — both of the last three years' recorded sales were full-floor configurations. The May 2024 closing of Apt 9 at $17.5M (-12.5% from the $20M last ask, -30% from the $25M original ask) is the more recent benchmark: a ~6,500-sqft 6BR/7.5BA full-floor Candela layout with 16 rooms, 11-foot ceilings, three wood-burning fireplaces, 42 oversized soundproofed windows, and a staff wing — closing at $2,692/sf. The May 2023 sale of Apt 12 at $24.95M ($3,838/sf assuming a similar floor plate) remains the building's high-water mark of the period. The pattern reflects 778 Park's posture: an extremely narrow active-buyer pool (cash buyers acquiring as individuals for primary residence in their own name, with no financing, no trusts, no pied-à-terre, no corporate purchases), producing infrequent transactions where price discovery often extends across multiple ask cycles before a clearing trade.
Recent transfers at this building, curated by The Roebling Team research desk. Apartment-level facts are independently verified before publishing; sale prices reflect the recorded transfer amount at the NYC Department of Finance.
| Date | Unit | Apartment | Price | PPSF | vs. Ask |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 14, 2024 | Apt 9 (full-floor) | 6 BR · 7.5 BA · 6,500 sf · Four exposures (Park Avenue corner) · Full-floor Rosario Candela layout with 16 rooms, 11-foot ceilings, 3 wood-burning fireplaces, 42 oversized soundproofed windows, custom moldings, inlaid hardwood floors; staff wing with windowed laundry and 3 staff rooms Closed May 3, 2024 at $17.5M — 12.5% under the $20M last ask and 30% under the $25M original ask. Full-floor Candela at ~$2,692/sf; a rare 2024 print on tier-one Park Avenue Candela inventory and a benchmark for the modest PPSF appreciation profile of these prewar co-ops. | $17,500,000 | $2,692/sf | -12.5% |
| Jun 14, 2023 | Apt 12 (full-floor) | 5 BR · 5 BA · Full-floor Candela layout Closed May 2, 2023 at $24.95M — approximately $3,838/sf assuming a similar 6,500-sqft floor plate. The building's high-water mark of the last three years. | $24,950,000 | off-mkt | |
| Mar 9, 2022 | Apt 2 | 3 BR · 3 BA Closed Feb 23, 2022 at $6M — 16.67% under the $7.2M asking price. Floor-2 configuration; lower-floor inventory at 778 Park trades materially below the building's full-floor benchmarks. | $6,000,000 | -16.7% | |
| Mar 8, 2019 | Apt 11 | 6 BR · 5+ BA Closed Mar 7, 2019 at $27M — 15.63% under the $32M asking price. Notable context: the same 11th-floor apartment was first listed as '11-FLOOR' at $35.5M in June 2018 and withdrawn — a clean withdraw-and-relist sequence ($35.5M ask → off-market → $32M relist → $27M close, or 23.9% below the original ask). The pattern is recurring at 778 Park: price discovery often extends across multiple ask cycles before a clearing trade. | $27,000,000 | -15.6% | |
| Jun 9, 2015 | Apt 15 | 4 BR · 4.5 BA Closed May 27, 2015 at $28.5M — 25% under the $38M asking price. The single largest ask-to-close discount in 778 Park's modern dataset; $9.5M absolute-dollar reduction. Useful calibration point for any seller weighing whether to start at a stretched number. | $28,500,000 | -25.0% | |
| Mar 2, 2015 | 1 | 1,700 sf | $2,440,665 | $1,436/sf | off-mkt |
| Dec 19, 2013 | Apt 17 | 3 BR · 3 BA Closed Dec 9, 2013 at $18M — 20% under the $22.5M asking price. Smaller program (3BR/3BA) at the high-floor end of the building; the discount-to-ask was steep but in line with 778 Park's broader pattern. | $18,000,000 | -20.0% | |
| Nov 28, 2011 | Apt 18 (top-floor) | 4 BR · 4.5 BA Closed Nov 9, 2011 at $19M — 2.56% under the $19.5M asking price. One of the cleanest ask-to-close ratios in 778 Park's recorded history; top-floor configuration. | $19,000,000 | -2.6% |
Market read. Most recent trades (2024) cleared a median $2,692/sf across 1 sale. Median listing discount 15.7% from the last ask — a recurring negotiation gap worth pricing into any offer or listing strategy.
The retrade record
Lines that have traded more than once in the public record — the building’s appreciation arc, apartment by apartment.
Other recent transfers
| Date | Unit | Price |
|---|---|---|
| May 19, 2026 | 12 | $21,250,000 |
| Dec 14, 2010 | MAIS | $8,750,000 |
| Dec 3, 2007 | 14 | $27,500,000 |
| May 11, 2005 | 1 | $1,400,000 |
Full closing history with price-per-square-foot over time, the complete retrade record, and every line that has traded.
Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 1-01388-0033) 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 on co-ops is not officially recorded, figures shown are approximate.
What to know if you’re buying
Financing is not permitted. 778 Park requires 100% cash purchases. The building's central screen, alongside 740 Park and the Gold Coast Fifth Avenue tier-one co-ops.
Trust purchases are explicitly not allowed. The building's house rules carry this prohibition in explicit terms. Buyers seeking trust or LLC structures for estate-planning or privacy purposes cannot acquire at 778 Park. Compare to 1040 Fifth (trust permitted with Transfer Agent guidance) or 834 Fifth (case-by-case) — 778 Park is the strict pole.
Pied-à-terre is not allowed. Primary residence is required. Buyers planning to maintain the apartment as a New York pied-à-terre while based elsewhere full-time should look at 820 Fifth (which permits pied-à-terre) or condominium inventory instead.
Co-purchasing is permitted — but parents buying for children (employed or student) is not. The building accommodates joint purchases between partners but does not allow the structural arrangement where parents buy for adult children.
The 3% flip tax is buyer-paid at closing. On a $25M apartment, that is $750,000 of buyer-side closing cost.
Board approval is rigorous and intimate. With 18 apartments and a small institutional culture, buyers should expect both financial and behavioral scrutiny. Personal references matter. Long-term residency intent is the working assumption.
The full-floor configuration is the apartment. Buyers should understand the building's architecture before committing — the elevator-vestibule entry, the multiple-exposure layouts, the private-terrace possibilities. Apartments at 778 Park are not interchangeable with multi-per-floor Candela peers like 740 Park.
What to know if you’re selling
Marketing requires building familiarity. The buyer pool for 778 Park is narrow and institutional. Brokers should be familiar with the building's full-floor configuration story, the Astor and Herbert apartment context, and the comparable pricing across the recent transaction history.
Pricing reflects the full-floor configuration premium. Apartments at 778 Park compete with full-floor inventory at peer buildings (820 Fifth, 1 Sutton Place South), not with multi-per-floor pre-wars where 4,000–6,000 sf is achieved through layout rather than dedicated floor.
The buyer pool requires patience. The Astor apartment's three-year time-on-market between 2007 and ~2010 is the canonical signal: extraordinary apartments at extraordinary prices in the most selective configurations require willingness to wait for the right qualified buyer.
Closing timelines are co-op standard. 6–10 weeks from contract signing to closing.
Comparable buildings
If you're considering 778 Park Avenue, also evaluate:
- 740 Park Avenue — Candela/Cross & Cross 1930; larger inventory (33 apartments); the apex of Gold Coast pre-war prestige
- 820 Fifth Avenue — Starrett & Van Vleck 1916; smaller (13 apartments); full-floor configuration; pied-à-terre permitted
- 1 Sutton Place South — Hand & Stieg 1927; East River Park-facing; full-floor configuration
- River House (435 East 52nd) — Bottomley Wagner & White 1931; East River trophy; full-floor configuration
- 875 Park Avenue — Candela 1929; J-shaped configuration; tier-one Park Avenue
- 740 Park's Candela peers: 720 Park, 730 Park, 770 Park
The Roebling Team at 778 Park Avenue
The Roebling Team at Compass specializes in Central Park West, the Upper East Side, and the broader Park-facing Manhattan market. We publish this building profile because Park Avenue buyers and sellers deserve building-specific intelligence — architecture, board culture, transactional mechanics, and the realities of pricing at the apartment level — not generic market commentary.
If you're considering a purchase or sale at 778 Park, a 30-minute consultation is the right starting point. We'll bring the full context this page provides plus the transactional specifics your situation requires — financial structuring, board approvability, comparable analysis at the apartment level, and the pacing strategy that fits your timeline.