92 Remsen Street

A twenty-five-foot brick house of 1835, four storeys counting the mansard, entered at or near grade since the stoop's removal. The Commission's secondary designations — Eclectic style, stucco as a secondary material — describe a front that was reworked rather than restored: mansard slope and dormers at the top, later window and door treatment below, and the original Federal proportions still governing the openings underneath. It is a good building to look at twice.

Dividing roughly 6,484 square feet of building area among ten apartments gives about 650 gross building square feet per apartment; that includes no verified deduction for shared or structural space and does not establish private interior areas or bedroom counts. Use the actual apartment plans to establish any repeated lines or combinations: ceiling heights change floor to floor, the mansard storey has its own geometry and its own light, and the garden apartments face onto an exceptionally deep rear yard. Front rooms face north to Remsen Street; rear rooms face south into the block, with daylight depending on the actual windows, floor and neighboring obstructions.

Everything on the front is regulated fabric. On a house where the Commission has already recorded the loss of the original details, a restoration proposal — stoop, ironwork, cornice, sash — will be reviewed against that record, and the mansard's slate, flashing and dormers are their own recurring project.

The corporation has held the house since the 1982 closing. No elevator or staff is documented in the records reviewed, and HPD lists the registered agent at the building’s address; that address does not establish self-management or exclude an outside agent. Confirm current arrangements and use audited statements, reserves, debt and assessment history to evaluate costs. Ten apartments do not establish ten distinct shareholders or a lower maintenance burden.

The debt record is the headline. Across more than four decades of cooperative ownership the corporation has recorded a $15,000 facility in 1987, roughly $13,000 from the National Consumer Cooperative Bank's mortgage affiliate in 1994, and $140,000 from Emigrant Funding in 2004 — with nothing since. Those recorded instruments do not establish the current balance, other obligations or the funding of capital work. Obtain current financial statements and the debt schedule. Ask what the last three capital cycles cost and how they were paid for.

The capital list for an 1835 brick house with a mansard is specific: the mansard roof itself, dormer flashing, façade and cornice maintenance with applicable Landmarks review, party walls with Nos. 90 and 94, the retaining structures at the back of a very deep yard, and the age of the risers and heating plant. This recorded four-story house is below FISP’s more-than-six-story threshold.

One title item deserves naming. Alongside the December 1982 cooperative deed, ACRIS indexes a January 25, 1983 deed from 92 Co. to a separate entity against this same tax lot. Conversion-era filings of this kind are usually housekeeping — a correction, a partial release, a companion parcel — but the title report should explain it rather than list it.

Recent sales

Recent transfers 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.

Sales sourced from NYC Department of Finance recorded transfers (BBL 3-00253-0069). 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.

Read the assessment history first. The reviewed mortgage chain ends with a 2004 instrument; it does not establish current debt or how later capital work was funded. Find out how much, how often, and what is queued next.

Ask the mansard question. The top storey is a nineteenth-century addition with its own roof, slope, dormers and flashing. Its condition and its last replacement date belong in your diligence file.

Have your title company explain the January 1983 deed. It is indexed against this lot and it postdates the cooperative closing. Almost certainly routine; get it in writing anyway.

Confirm what the rear yard is and who has it. Seventy feet of open ground behind a Heights house is a real asset; whether it is common or assigned to the garden apartments is a question for the proprietary lease.

Assume a walk-up. No elevator is recorded here.

Tell the Whitehouse-to-mansard story. An 1835 house with a named owner-developer in the LPC's file and a documented Second Empire remodelling is a listing that can say something specific and true.

Sell the depth of the lot. Seventy feet of rear yard opening onto the Grace Court Alley block interior is the building's scarcest feature, and it is invisible from the street.

Lead with the balance sheet. Provide current debt, management and ownership information with the ten-apartment count. A sparse recorded mortgage chain and an on-site registered-agent address do not establish an unlevered, self-managed corporation or lender eligibility.

Price against the district's converted houses, not the corridor. The comparable set is the Federal and Greek Revival stock on this stretch and around Grace Court — not the elevator buildings east of Henry Street.

If you're considering 92 Remsen Street, also evaluate:

• 100 Remsen Street — full-service cooperative on the far side of the Henry Street corner; confirm the construction history and current service model
• 76 Remsen Street — Slee & Bryson's 1922 cooperative on the same tax block; the purpose-built alternative
• 68 Remsen Street — H. I. Feldman's 1929 elevator cooperative, also on this block
• 60 Remsen Street — the 1955 cooperative at the Hicks Street corner of the same block; the postwar comparison
• 134 Remsen Street — ten-apartment cooperative on the Clinton Street end of Remsen; the closest peer in scale
• 44 Remsen Street — small cooperative on the harbor end of the same street
• 19 Grace Court — Sugarman & Berger's 1925 cooperative on the cul-de-sac immediately west
• 2 Grace Court — large elevator cooperative on the same cul-de-sac
• 205 Hicks Street — cooperative one block west; the same walk-up register on a quieter street