838 Greenwich Street

Four residential floors plus a penthouse level in brick, on a 4,085-square-foot lot with about 18,969 square feet of residential floor area. The building's built floor-area ratio is 4.64 against a residential FAR of 2.43 under the underlying R6 zoning — a legally non-conforming bulk, which is one reason a 1981 apartment house of this density exists on this block at all. The twenty-nine apartments run from studios through one- and two-bedroom layouts, with penthouse units at the top. Apartment designations in recorded transfers run 1A, 1C, 1D, 1F, 2A, 2D, 2E, 2F, 3A, 3C, 4C, 4D, 4E, 4F and PHC, PHD, PHE, so the plate carries roughly six apartments per floor with a smaller penthouse level above. Renovation activity is steady: DOB filings show individual apartment alterations in most years since 2009, including a documented mezzanine enlargement in one fourth-floor unit and interior stair replacements in the penthouses, which suggests double-height or duplexed volume at the top of the building.

Elevator, renovated lobby, central laundry and storage; no doorman. Payroll in the audited financial statements on file runs under $35,000 a year, which places the building firmly in the self-service tier and keeps maintenance correspondingly low. Recent documented capital work includes gas line replacement, boiler steam and water line work, a new duplex condensate unit and Parker valve, a heat timer, window replacement and curb valve replacement. A fire occurred in the building in July 2018 causing significant damage; the corporation received roughly $145,000 of insurance proceeds, repairs were still in progress at the date of the most recent audit on file, and a claim for lost maintenance income remained unresolved. Beginning December 2017 the board implemented a special assessment of approximately $12,000 per month, initially to bridge the gap while a new façade signage licensee was secured and subsequently extended to fund operations and capital work; whether it remains in place today should be confirmed with the managing agent.

The underlying financing is documented and recently reset. In June 2015 the corporation placed a first mortgage of $1,250,000 at 3.92 percent on a thirty-year amortization schedule, together with a $250,000 credit line of which $100,000 had been drawn by year-end 2019. That mortgage matured on June 1, 2025, and public records show the corporation refinanced at maturity: instruments recorded in May and June 2025 satisfy the prior debt and record a consolidated first mortgage of approximately $1.65 million alongside a separate $1 million facility. A buyer should obtain the current rate, term and balance from the managing agent.

J-51 — expired. DOF's historical J-51 file records benefits on Block 643, Lot 57 with an abatement opening at an initial year of 1981 — a twelve-year term at a 90 percent abatement rate against $541,900 of certified alteration cost — and a companion exemption opening at an initial year of 1982 carrying an exempt value of roughly $806,000. The file runs from tax year 1981 through tax year 1996. On a twelve-year term the abatement burned off around tax year 1993 and the exemption phased out through the mid-1990s. Nothing remains.

Current position. DOF's assessment roll carries about $11,050 of exemption against roughly $2.8 million of total assessed value — ordinary shareholder-level credits, not a program benefit. The building pays a conventional Manhattan tax bill, embedded in maintenance, with no step-down and no expiry to model. Real estate taxes ran about $247,000 in the most recent audited year on file, or roughly 49 percent of total operating expenses.

The policy stack here is unusually well documented for a small co-op, because the house rules, pet policy and sublet policy are on file.

• Flip tax: 2 percent of the sale price at three years of ownership or less, 1 percent above three and up to five years, and none beyond five years, per management-sourced records. A declining, holding-period-keyed flip tax is uncommon and materially changes the seller's math on a short hold.
• Subletting: permitted after two years of ownership; minimum 30 days, maximum one year per term with board-approved extensions; no more than four consecutive years absent special circumstances. Management-sourced records describe the building as sublet-friendly with unlimited subletting after a seasoning period — where those descriptions and the policy on file disagree, the policy on file governs, and the four-year cap is the number to plan around.
• Sublet fee: 33.3 percent of maintenance in years one and two, 40 percent in years three and four, 50 percent thereafter, prorated daily and charged monthly.
• Board package and interview: full financial disclosure, two personal and two professional references per applicant, two years of tax returns with W-2s, a credit authorization, and an interview of all adult occupants. Sublet applicants face the same process.
• Pets: dogs require prior written board consent with a $500 non-refundable fee, under a policy effective January 1, 2015; subtenants are not permitted dogs.
• Pied-à-terre, parents buying for children, gifting and guarantors: described in management-sourced records as considered case by case. Not published by the corporation.
• Financing ceiling, minimum down payment, post-closing liquidity, and trust or LLC purchases: not documented in any source we have examined. These are the questions to put to the managing agent first.
• Alterations: governed by an alteration agreement on file; noisy work is restricted to weekdays between 8:30 a.m. and 5:00 p.m.

Recent sales

Recent transfers 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. $/sf is measured on the latest sales with reliable square footage (2022): a median $2,374/sf across 1 sale. The building has traded as recently as 2024. Median listing discount 2.6% 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 1-00643-0057) 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.

Read the sublet policy before you assume flexibility. The building is genuinely sublet-tolerant by West Village standards, but the policy on file requires two years of ownership before a first sublet, caps consecutive subletting at four years, and imposes a fee that reaches half of maintenance. If your plan involves a long-term rental, this is not the building.

Ask what happens when the signage lease ends. A ten-year façade signage lease signed in 2017 supplies a meaningful share of the building's non-maintenance revenue. Ask the managing agent for the expiration date, the renewal posture, and how the budget absorbs the loss.

Ask whether the 2017 assessment is still running. It was in place at the most recent audit on file and had already been extended once.

Get the financing ceiling in writing. It is not published anywhere. Confirm the maximum loan-to-value and any post-closing liquidity expectation before you commit to a mortgage contingency.

Landmark status is real but manageable. Exterior work needs LPC approval. Interior alteration is governed by the co-op's alteration agreement, not by Landmarks.

Lead with the flip tax schedule if you have held more than five years. A zero flip tax is a real number in a buyer's mind and a real number in yours.

Have the fire and insurance history documented. A 2018 fire and the associated claim appear in the audited statements. Buyers' attorneys will find it; a clean, documented account of the repair and resolution neutralizes it.

Position against the doorman buildings. The pitch is low maintenance, a landmark district, and a location most West Village co-ops cannot match. Buyers comparing all-in monthly costs across full-service buildings should see the difference laid out.

• 822 Greenwich Street — the neighboring cooperative on Block 642, and the building most often confused with this one
• 77 Horatio Street — same block, Greenwich Village Historic District rather than Gansevoort Market
• 2 Horatio Street — West Village cooperative on the same corridor
• 14 Horatio Street — small Horatio Street cooperative
• 61 Jane Street — boutique far-west-Village cooperative
• 100 Bank Street — cooperative in the same far-west blocks
• 644 Greenwich Street — Greenwich Street cooperative to the south
• 720 Greenwich Street — larger Greenwich Street cooperative
• 652 Hudson Street — nearby cooperative outside the historic districts
• 345 West 13th Street — Meatpacking District conversion, the contrasting product type