Co-op of the Day: 111 Hicks Street, #18F
The alcove studio on the 18th floor of 111 Hicks Street was recently renovated and listed with an asking price of $419,000. The views are to die for and the apartment looks to be in good shape; we’re not wild about the aesthetics of the kitchen or bathroom though. Are you? 111 Hicks Street, #18F…
The alcove studio on the 18th floor of 111 Hicks Street was recently renovated and listed with an asking price of $419,000. The views are to die for and the apartment looks to be in good shape; we’re not wild about the aesthetics of the kitchen or bathroom though. Are you?
111 Hicks Street, #18F [Halstead] GMAP P*Shark
Thanks for the inside scoop.
Whoa, as a regular Brownstoner reader, I was not surprised to see a bunch of posts from readers who seem to have nothing better to do than idly speculate about a place they have never set foot in and haven’t even so much as done 30 seconds research about the building or the neighborhood on Street Easy. But I will admit that it did bother me that these posts were about the building that I call home, so I thought I would post a little information to set the record straight.
As I do live in the building and have also been on the Board in the past, I will be the first to tell you that this apartment is way overpriced. But instead of making unfounded accusations against people you have never even met, I think one has to acknowledge that Halstead (as well as the owner) has to take some responsibility for this figure. I know from looking at other listings in the nabe, that Halstead as well as other realtors tends to overprice a lot of their properties just to see what will stick.
17C, just below it, which is the same layout and an even better renovation, just sold for $360,000, which I thought was too high but clearly someone wanted it, probably for the views which are pretty fabulous.
Yes, the maintenance in the building is high, but the finances themselves are in excellent shape, due to the diligence and acumen of the current board. In the past, when the real estate market has not been overheated, the prices in the building have been lower than in comparable buildings in the neighborhood as they they have reflected the high maintenenance. (Those studios near 300K could have been bought for $25,000 in the early and mid 1990s:) It’s only in the tail end of the irrational exuberance of the NYC real estate market that prices in our building have become often unrealistic.
FYI, the maintenance is high for several reasons that are way more complicated than I could detail here, but to give you an idea:
-taxes are high in the neighborhood and for the building, as has been pointed out here previously
-it’s an old building that requires a lot of upkeep
-the original developer that did the conversion took out a lot of money from the plan and saddled the building with a very high underlying mortgage which is being paid down but still substantial 25 years later.
-also the conversion was not done to last and there had been a lot of deferred maintenance, until the last seven or eight years when the predecessors of the current board started addressing these problems which unfortunately also increased costs
-it’s a totally full service building–24 hour doorman, live in super, on site manager and porters and cleaning staff on from 7 AM to midnight seven days a week
-as an extra large building, we get saddled with increased costs, such as added insurance (which went way up after 9/11), and extra RE taxes on top of the high rate.
All that said, the building is home to almost 300 units, all of them occupied by friendly people of all walks of life. The building has a longstanding reputation of being friendly and open to people of all sorts of backgrounds and preferences, unlike many other buildings in the neighborhood, and that’s why many shareholders in the coop have chosen to live in the building.
1. Taxes are higher in Brooklyn Heights than most (if not all) other parts of Brooklyn.
2. Taxes on NYC co-ops are higher than on NYC houses.
3. Ergo, co-ops in Brooklyn Heights pay a lot of taxes.
4. High taxes = high maintenance charges.
You might very well think the maintenance charges for Heights co-ops are too high, but it’s usually related to taxes, not to snobby co-op boards who think they can get away with charging an arm and a leg (or two), as seems to be the general tone of comments here whenever the topic comes up.
According to the building’s website, about 1/3 of the maintenance goes to taxes. If the monthly maintenance is $875, that translates to $3500/year – as BH76 points out, this studio pays more in taxes than most of the Brownstone Belt houses featured here.
http://tinyurl.com/lgeqtc
BH76:
It doesn’t matter if it’s going towards actual maintenance or taxes, it’s the monthly amount that’s absolutely insane.
And it only goes up!
My mortgage payment for my studio isn’t much more than the maintenance of this place. Ridonkulous.
My bf pays less in maintenance than this for a 2BR in a full service building. This maintenance is too damn high for a studio apartment. Period.
When everyone criticizes buildings for their maintenance costs will you please at least try to understand how much of it is related to real estate taxes that coops pay at MUCH higher rates than all of you with your brownstones? This little studio likely pays $3-4K a year in real estate taxes as part of its maintenance.
wow, I was about to go off on how you could rent a 2BR for this monthly, but that view is a panty-dropper.
Well, on is not always alone in a studio. There are times you might want privacy. But the positive of a larger studio is the openness of the space. Some, like this one, are certainly conceivable with a separated bedroom, unlike many studios which are simply too small. It’s a very individual thing, I think, what one’s preferences and priorities are. Personally it’d be hard for me to give up either the privacy or space.
Good answer DS.
I would agree. I would not put up a wall in a place like this either. That bedroom would feel like a deathtrap.