New 4-story Condo
Hi All, So here is the question. I am planning on buying a 2-bedroom in a 4 story rehabbed 4 apartment brownstone in the Slope. Love the place, but imagine there are a ton of drawbacks, including getting a mortgage. Has anyone bought in this type of building. What has been their experience? Thanks!
Hi All,
So here is the question. I am planning on buying a 2-bedroom in a 4 story rehabbed 4 apartment brownstone in the Slope. Love the place, but imagine there are a ton of drawbacks, including getting a mortgage. Has anyone bought in this type of building. What has been their experience?
Thanks!
I would agree with Park Sloper. Most of his or her statements are pretty on-point as to realistically managing a small condominium after purchase.
OP — On top of some banks requiring that 75% or 80% of the condominium being in contract in order to be willing to lend, you need to find out whether the developer/sponsor has obtained a certificate of occupancy for the building and your unit. If there is no C of O or there is only a temporary C of O, you are taking extra risks by entering into contract this early in the game. Not only from the perspective of difficulty of obtaining a loan, the developer may go broke, run off and disappear, depending on who it is and its reputation. If you have no C of O you can not close. If you closed on with a temporary C of O, you will have a headache that stays with you for years to come. One of which being that you will not be able to obtain home insurance.
Park Sloper, thanks so much. That is so great to hear. Yeah, I love the place and that sounds like a reasonable way of handeling things. Did you buy it new after it was just made into a condo? What was your experience then?
I can’t address the mortgage issue, but I live in a four-unit condo, and it’s nice because it feels like a house (I have the garden duplex, so I enter on the parlor level and have exclusive use of the garden), but you have three other owners to share building expenses with (for example, I’ve lived there for 8 years, and in that time we’ve replaced our roof and re-built our interior stairs — costs I was able to share).
We had a management company but it soon became apparent that it was cheaper to manage ourselves. We have a finance guy who acts as treasurer, and a lawyer who is the condo board president. We hire someone to deal with garbage and vacuum the common areas once a week. But if everyone agrees and can afford it, it would be easier to outsource all of that.
I think what happens is you make an offer and sign a contract with a mortgage contingency. The sale will not close until at 75% in contract and then closings are scheduled. If 75% is never reached, there has to be a contingency for the bank and you to get out.
Yeah, that is the problem. I doubt anyone is going to give me a mortgage as the first purchase. It would be so hard. Eh, the place is nice though.
What kinds of drawbacks do you imagine?
In my experience, fianancing should not be a problem, usually banks look for at least 75% occupancy though so make sure you have a mortgage contingency in the contract.
a 4 unit condo is typically easy to manage because there are only 4 people to worry about the decision making. You will all either have to pitch in maintaining the building or come up with some agreement on maintenance.