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Buying is ALWAYS a BIG Mistake
Started by gsung
about 16 years ago
Posts: 2
Member since: Dec 2009
Discussion about
ONCE BITTEN Rene Gonzalez and Colleen Mathis moved to get away from mice. WHEN it comes to homes and spouses, one bad experience can alter a person’s choices forever. TWICE SHY Laura Zanzal and her roommate Alex North have discovered the joy of a live-in super. And in New York City, where there are untold challenges to vertical living, a seemingly endless number of pitfalls lie in the real estate... [more]
ONCE BITTEN Rene Gonzalez and Colleen Mathis moved to get away from mice. WHEN it comes to homes and spouses, one bad experience can alter a person’s choices forever. TWICE SHY Laura Zanzal and her roommate Alex North have discovered the joy of a live-in super. And in New York City, where there are untold challenges to vertical living, a seemingly endless number of pitfalls lie in the real estate road. Bad choices include: the location of one’s building, insufferable neighbors both human and feral, long-distance supers, heat-conducting windows and prized amenities that turn out to be booby prizes. Consider the unfortunate story of Rob Paladino. Three years ago, he rented a one-bedroom pied-à-terre on the fifth floor of a new apartment building in the garment district. For $3,800 a month, he got a generous 600-square-foot patio, built above four floors of retail space on top of the building’s first setback. “It was a big feature, and I really believed it was worth the extra few hundred dollars a month,” said Mr. Paladino, a single 52-year-old digital media entrepreneur who looked forward to entertaining friends outdoors. Soon after unpacking, Mr. Paladino furnished his outdoor space with a table and chairs, a barbecue and Christmas lights. Then came the cigarette butts: incendiary paratroopers raining down from Mr. Paladino’s neighbors — 40 stories of them, or about 280 apartments. Mr. Paladino thinks his neighbors, mostly young professionals sharing places, assumed the butts would float to the street. Instead, “they would burn through my awning and the patio chairs,” he said. “I would make a game trying to figure out what the brands were.” (Lots of Newports, he said.) Enough flotsam made its way to the patio that Mr. Paladino asked the super to clean it up every week. Then one morning a sad young Japanese couple appeared at his door. “They couldn’t communicate why, but they seemed to really need to get out on the patio, so I let them through,” Mr. Paladino said. Their cat, it turned out, had plunged from the 36th floor to the great beyond. Still determined to enjoy what most New Yorkers would consider a perk of enviable proportions, Mr. Paladino persevered — until the night he held an alfresco gathering that collided with a couple’s argument 8 or 10 floors overhead. “When the first candy dish hit, it sounded like gunfire,” he said. “Glass shards went everywhere. We ran inside and more stuff came down — a little statuette, a child’s toy, a model car. After that, it didn’t feel safe out there.” Mr. Paladino forsook his prized patio and, six months later, the apartment. He moved to a third-floor walk-up in the meatpacking district. Now he says he would consider another patio or terrace only if it were on a very high floor. “If you’re on the 16th floor with a setback patio and there’s only 9 floors above you, that’s totally different,” he said. Not only are there fewer potential sources of detritus, but, he speculated, people who pay a premium to live on a higher floor might be more courteous and respectful. Many of the walking wounded have nothing against their apartment or building: It’s the location that offends. For example, people who have lived near an elevator frequently balk at doing so again. “They feel the elevators themselves are noisy and also people tend to congregate in front of the elevator,” said Laurence P. Mitchell, an associate broker at Prudential Douglas Elliman. Others refuse to live beneath a terrace after suffering through floods caused by blocked drains and the like, said Paul Purcell, a founder of Charles Rutenberg Realty. And just as veterans of sixth-floor walk-ups don’t reprise the experience if they can afford not to, many ground-floor-dwellers vow to shoot higher next time. When Alina Munoz moved to New York nearly four years ago, she shared a ground-floor street-facing two-bedroom apartment with several roommates. “It didn’t allow much natural light because we kept the blinds closed for privacy from the street,” said Ms. Munoz, 27, a founder of Culintro, a restaurant-industry trade organization. “You could hear every conversation. And every single morning at 7:30, the doorman would hose off the sidewalk and the windows, so every Saturday and Sunday, I would be woken up with what sounded like a fire hose blasting at my windows.” Ms. Munoz’s low-level misery was complicated by another location issue: Her building was adjacent to a church. “On Saturday and Sunday mornings, you would hear kids playing and the parents would stand around letting kids be kids,” she said. “Then they also had gatherings like Alcoholics Anonymous, and on Tuesday or Thursday night there would always be a group of smokers outside — you could hear them when you’re on the ground floor.” Lee Alexander’s horror stories include rats and racket. She now lives in quiet Stuyvesant Town. Loud, smoke-emitting crowds are more commonly associated with nightclubs, bars and restaurants, not always the best downstairs neighbors. Once bitten, many people vet prospective blocks, sometimes conducting late-night sweeps to check for club activity invisible during the day. But it is easier to miss acoustical nightmares on the next block, in the form of a fire station or something more mysterious. Flavie Bagnol, the director of communications for Thrillist.com, rented an apartment on East 64th Street, near but not facing Second Avenue. Late-night trucks racing down the avenue would hit something that sounded like a bump, triggering thunderous, bone-rattling explosions. “I looked many times to see if there was a speed bump or a hole, but there was really nothing beyond maybe an uneven part of the road,” Ms. Bagnol said. “I tried earplugs, white noise, thicker curtains, music, and nothing ever covered it. I didn’t sleep well for two years.” When her lease was up, she bought a studio apartment facing a courtyard in the West 60s. “The first thing I did when I looked at the apartment,” Ms. Bagnol said “was see if there was a lot of traffic, like any buses stopping by, and I made sure I was not on a main artery. I went back at night and checked the noise with the window open and closed.” Other city dwellers run from a more intimate nuisance. Last December, Colleen Mathis, 27, and her boyfriend, Rene Gonzalez, 35, sublet a rent-controlled apartment from a friend of Ms. Mathis’s family. It was a one-bedroom walk-up in the East 70s for $600 a month. “When we first moved in, we noticed a little bit of a problem with mice,” Ms. Mathis said. “Then, in January, I was sleeping and felt this little tickle on my feet, and I woke up to a mouse scurrying off the bed. About two months ago, it got really bad — we were seeing maybe two mice a day.” This fall, after a mouse stole up her arm and she accidentally drank a cup of coffee laced with mouse droppings, Ms. Mathis and Mr. Gonzalez reluctantly went looking for another apartment. They took a flashlight on their hunt, searching for telltale signs: droppings and “weird holes” between walls and floors. “We almost took a duplex that seemed too good to be true,” said Ms. Mathis, a publicist. They ruled it out when Mr. Gonzalez, a freelance videographer, turned up incriminating evidence with the flashlight. They recently rented a large one-bedroom apartment in an older, well-maintained walk-up on East 88th Street near Madison Avenue for $1,600 a month. The day they moved out of their mouse pad, their downstairs neighbor was leaving for the same reason. Lee Alexander, a television producer, broke her lease two months after moving into a building on St. Marks Place that turned out to have rats in the walls and the basement laundry room. When she found the ground-floor apartment, it had never occurred to her to look for signs of rats, like the presence of pesticides and warnings to keep garbage cans tightly shut. Having come to believe that living on the ground floor means living closer to vermin territory, she fled to a top-floor apartment around the corner on Second Avenue. Her rat problem vanished, only to be replaced by a different species of nuisance, one she might have avoided if she had checked out the apartment at night. Her place was within shouting distance of “Stomp,” a musical predicated on the percussive potential of not only heavy boots, but hub caps and garbage can lids. “My bathroom was right over the backstage for ‘Stomp,’ so from 8 to 11 p.m. nightly I got the full show in my bathroom,” Ms. Alexander said. “It was an awful, noisy situation.” She lived there for several years before rising to the top of the waiting list (and a top-floor apartment) in Stuyvesant Town, a sprawling apartment complex whose residents don’t drum on trash bins. However, the owners were recently found to have improperly raised rents and deregulated units. “For the most part it’s a lovely, quiet place to live, except for the weird increases in rent,” Ms. Alexander said. As Ms. Alexander’s experience illustrates, it can be hard to spot trouble unless you are already sensitized to the dangers. “I will never again buy a sponsor-renovated apartment,” said Matthew Grob, who along with his wife, Betsy Lichtenstein, purchased a two-bedroom apartment in Lincoln Towers on the Upper West Side a decade ago. At the time, with Ms. Lichtenstein six months pregnant, the deal seemed too good to pass up. They were happy not to have to renovate. But Mr. Grob, a health care consultant, said they came to regret it: He and his wife are disappointed by the shoddy workmanship, cheap fixtures and cramped kitchen layout they continue to endure. One of the couple’s neighbors harbors a different regret, in the form of the 15th- floor terrace that transformed into a menace after her daughter was born. “Once I had a baby, I wanted to nail it shut forever so she could never get out there,” said Wendy Siegel, a career counselor at New York University’s School of Law. “I would rather have a bigger apartment — or a parking spot.” Mr. Purcell, the broker, said that among the recurring never-agains he hears is the one about buying something that doesn’t actually exist. “I have had many people say I will never live in new construction again until it’s fully built out and I can see what I’m getting,” he said. As for Mr. Purcell, he fled south-facing floor-to-ceiling windows, trading them for an apartment with open views facing north. “I boiled, even in the winter time — it was like a heat box,” he said. Also, he complained, “my floors were bleached and my furniture was bleached if I didn’t put my blinds down every day, so what was the point of having a view?” Other apartment hunters, shuddering at the memory of long winters without a ray of sunlight streaming through the windows, give north-facing apartments the cold shoulder. But some would rather go without sunlight than an on-site super. “We didn’t have a live-in super at my last apartment, and it was just a disaster,” said Laura Zanzal, 24, a renter who works in public relations. She shared an East 89th Street walk-up apartment with three roommates; the super lived in Queens. “When we didn’t have heat, we would call him and if it was only one of us calling, it didn’t make much of an impact. And the first month we lived there we had power outages and he would say ‘five minutes,’ but you’d have to call him again to make sure he was coming.” This fall, after one super-less year, she moved with two roommates into a full-service building: “As soon as we call with a problem, someone is there within minutes,” she said. [less]
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I've owned for most of my life and never had any major problems ther than rude elderly neighbrs. Your a fool if you think that buying is ALWAYS a mistake.,
Um ... and the point of this article is ... what? Don't live in a city?
All these horror stories are from RENTERS.
renting can also be a bad idea too. WHat happens if you get stuck with a slum lord? Everytime I watch Fox 5, they always seem to profile a slum lord abut every week.
Alpie, is this you in the feature photo?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/nyregion/06old.html?hp=&pagewanted=all
Battery Park City doesn't have problems like them.
Thank goodness these stories are for renters. Imagine going from dead cat, rodents, aa meetings, crazy neighbors and road noise paying 6% a clip. A friend once said as we backbacked thru Europe and Asia. Crap if I keep changing currencies enough, I'll have nothing left.
Buying isn't a mistake. The only time its a mistake is when you buy wrong, i.e. you paid 3.5m USD for a two-bedroom apartment.
Every renter I've ever lived near has a horror story to tell.
The good news is that we were all renter so at least there was a reasonable chance that the conditions would change. Let me share a renter nightmare that happened to a downstairs neighbor oh...about 1991.
I had moved to a 1 bedroom walk up rental on the UWS. The bedroom needed an in window AC so I took it upon myself to do the instillation. Basically my plan was to secure the window unit and cool my apartment. Several hours later we had a secure unit and a chilly pad. All was right with the world...or was it?
In window AC units have to be slightly tilted backwards to allow the condensation to form and then drip away from the building. At the time of instillation I was not focused on the thermodynamic components of the experience. I tilted the unit ever so slightly towards the building. Unbeknownst to me water was dripping toward this ancient UWS townhouse and draining into the in between space in the front wall and collecting above the ceiling of my downstairs neighbor. My place was fine and I was unaware of any problems transpiring.
I can't even imagine how much water collected in the ceiling but I'll bet it was A LOT!!!
When the dam broke it was amazing! The entire ceiling of my neighbor collapsed. Ton of water and debris filled the apartment. The destruction had a 'mini' Katrina like effect. I had no idea what caused the problem let alone the fact that it was me! I told as coworker about what had happened and without ever being in my place diagnosed the problem. He came home with me that very evening, to examine my AC unit and then spent about 10 minutes correcting the angle to insure that it would drip away from the building. The very next day the landlord arrived at my apartment with his expert handyman, screaming accusations, naming me the culprit of his building’s demise. I quickly established a position of plausible deniability. The owner ranted and raved as his trusty handyman evaluated my AC insulation. Imagine my relief when the handyman announced unequivocally that my AC unit was installed properly and was NOT the cause of the ceiling failure which allowed me some maneuver room for my own little drama.
HOW DARE YOU ACCUSE ME OF BLAH BLAH BLAH....
I tell you...shit happens.
The reason that I like to own is because I LOVE CO-OP BOARDS.
Falcongold, It helps to be in a full service building where you have an in-house superintendent, an on-staff handyman, and a managing agent to handle any crisis in real time. There is very little drama. You probably would have had expert assistance with the A/C installation had you been in a larger building.
you can own without ever seeing a co-op board. It's called a condo.
Ditto Steve! Boards nip problems in the bud, won't tolerate b.s. from bad neighbors, prevent tenants who don't give a damn about the building or anyone else in it because they have no skin in the game, maintain the building so your home looks great unlike a LL exacting every cent from the renters, and if you don't like things you can get on the board and change them yourself if your views are shared by others. I freakin' LOVE coops. People who have most trouble with coops have shady finances, don't play well with others, make bad neighbors, want to rent out their places to anyone and would happily inflict a crappy tenant on other owners. Now, some people find a condo they like and get it but have not much opinion one way or other about coop vs. condo. But those people who are all "ooo, I have ALL coops. Coops are soooo baaad," are the ones who worry me. I'm glad they feel that way because I sure as hell don't want them sharing my building.
"I LOVE CO-OP BOARDS."
Me too!
That's why I'm on one!
I know, Matt - in the past I've read some of your enchanting dissertations about your fantasy of absolute power.
so matt---how many of your fellow shareholders have you thrown out in the last couple of years?
Here's a couple recent true stories from owners I know:
1. Bought his apartment in 2007, thinking that he needed to own and it was stupid to rent. Watched his maintenance shoot up. Lost his job. Had to move out of town. Put his apartment on the block and was lucky to sell it, but lost 90% of his equity.
2. Woman I know lives in a building on upper east side. Facade of building collapsed, needs to be replaced. Her assessment was in the tens of thousands.
Ouch, talk about nightmares. Guess it happens regardless if you rent or own. As for me, my rental apartment is in a great location, quiet as can be. Only complaint is that occasionally the person upstairs treads heavily above my living room. Or that it takes a couple extra days for my landlord to fix something in my apartment. That's okay - it doesn't cost me anything.
except of course, if you rent, all you have to do is wait. if you own, you have to wait and then pay through the nose.
Interesting stories, beat.
I know of two people who bought within the past two years ... lost their jobs ... one is forced to sell (thank God she was even able to squeak out enough of a profit to pay the realtors and a modest sum for moving expenses) ... the other is so far underwater that his only option is to just sit tight and wait for the foreclosure proceedings (or to find a job, whichever comes first).
Ironically, if you've lost your job, blown through your savings, and can't afford your apartment, you're in a much better position as an OWNER (at least now, with all the banks being overwhelmed with foreclosures), because the process of being forced out of an apartment you own but have stopped paying the mortgage is much, much longer than being forced out of an apartment on which you've stopped paying rent.
so...
much better to buy and lose everything because ?
Doing the math on this: Bought his apartment in 2007, thinking that he needed to own and it was stupid to rent. Watched his maintenance shoot up. Lost his job. Had to move out of town. Put his apartment on the block and was lucky to sell it, but lost 90% of his equity.
Buy a $1MM co-op, put 20% down = $200,000. Lose 90% of equity means equity down to $20K and apartment down to $820K, so the apartment is down 18%.
but...nothing like the pleasure of ownership.
"because the process of being forced out of an apartment you own but have stopped paying the mortgage is much, much longer than being forced out of an apartment on which you've stopped paying rent."
Not in a co-op it's not. It's the exact same procedure as eviction: call the sheriff.
One more Matt theory down the drain.
And remember: New York is a recourse state: if you don't pay off your mortgage, the bank can go after your other assets to make up the difference, & can even garnish you future wages.
Nice.
Steve, you are such freakin' wise. I had no idea all a LL or Board had to do was pick up the phone and call the sheriff! Silly me thought there were lawyers, judges, court appearances, orders, time tables, and something called due process that had to be followed. Man, why do I always think things are so complicated. Thank you for clearing me up on that.
"Not in a co-op it's not. It's the exact same procedure as eviction: call the sheriff."
Only after the case has wound through the courts.
Cant be evicted from a co-op unless you dont pay maintenance which is a fraction of the rent in a rental.
"Cant be evicted from a co-op unless you dont pay maintenance which is a fraction of the rent in a rental."
And even if you don't pay maintenance, it still takes forever to evict a problem shareholder.
I know -- we're going through this very situation right now. So far it's taken 18 months and counting, between the court appeals and delays.
That is pretty embarassing for the building
mainematt: on another thread, you told us how easy it was to evict a shareholder. now you're changing your mind?
just in case you already forgot:
NYCMatt
about 3 hours ago
The board cancels the shareholder's proprietary lease, essentially forcing them to either hold onto shares in a building in which they cannot live (or sublet), or sell.
Hey have some empathy guy for people in tough spots.
NYCMatt
about 3 hours ago
It depends on each building's bylaws. Many boards DO reserve this right, but other buildings require a majority vote of all shareholders.
columbiacounty
so, mainematt, does the board have the right to do this unilaterally?
"The board cancels the shareholder's proprietary lease, essentially forcing them to either hold onto shares in a building in which they cannot live (or sublet), or sell."
Precisely.
I didn't say it was quick or simple. I said it could be DONE.
You too have some empathy.
hah, hah, hah.
you are a fucking dumb ass.
hey, i'm gonna be the next president of the united states.
"I didn't say it was quick or simple. I said it could be DONE."
Hey, behave we are talking about people down on their luck.
is matt down on his luck? sorry, i didn't realize.
People being evicted are. Now stop it.
here's matt on the holiday spirit:
"Slip a card into the building's Extortion (Holiday Bonus) Box with a receipt from your favorite charity, showing that you made a donation in all of their names.
Their hearts will be warmed by your holiday spirit."
Stop it I said.
oh...no...its you.
help, alan....hfscomm1 has re-emerged.
Well, kylewest, you would be wrong:
http://www.cooperator.com/articles/871/1/Push-and-Pullman/Page1.html
The Pullman decision grants co-ops the right to evict tenants under the business judgment rule, without judicial review. There is no winding through the courts for co-ops. Condominiums are another matter, as there's no lease.
http://cooperator.com/articles/512/1/Settling-Co-op-Disputes/Page1.html
It's a summary proceeding in housing court. Very fast.
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Borrower+beware:+Most+co-op+foreclosures+get+fast-tracked-a065227644
So kyle and Matt, welcome to the real world.
Heaven help some of you people.
couldn't stand being ignored, huh?
You were talking about kicking people out of their places and now what are you talking about. Stop it.
you have to work on changing your style as you morph...this was way too obvious.
The problem with gsung's analysis of the article is that most of the featured people were renters, not owners.
"Consider the unfortunate story of Rob Paladino. Three years ago, he rented a one-bedroom pied-�-terre on the fifth floor of a new apartment building in the garment district. For $3,800 a month, he got a generous 600-square-foot patio, built above four floors of retail space on top of the building%u2019s first setback.
"It was a big feature, and I really believed it was worth the extra few hundred dollars a month," said Mr. Paladino, a single 52-year-old digital media entrepreneur who looked forward to entertaining friends outdoors."
Note: this guy RENTED. Didn't own. Only had to put up with one year of suicidal cats and flying cigarette butts. While a terrible story, this article does not prove in any way that buying is inferior to renting. I realize that reading posted articles is unpopular on this board, but come ON. A little critical thinking, please?
I don't know what you are talking about now, but you are a little too colorful to be mistreating people being evicted.
I think the point is that you can easily leave a problem rental but you cannot easily leave if you own the problem apartment.
Hotproperty, that would be an excellent point - IF the post had been framed that way. It was not.
Steve, you have so overstated,misinterpreted,and distorted the "Pullman decision" over the years it isn't worth commenting anymore. Last time you gave legal advice I recall you ridiculously insisting that coop shares couldn't be owned in NYC as tenants in common. You're inability to refrain from offering legal opinions despite no legal training whatsoever is shameful.
kyle, first, I don't offer legal advice.
Second, co-op shares cannot be owned as a tenancy in common because tenancy in common is a real property concept and co-op shares are personal property. Certainly two names can be on the proprietary lease, but that is not a tenancy in common.
I haven't oversimplified anything: I have posted the rules on eviction from co-ops above. It is from authoritative sources (not from me). You posted an opinion. Your opinion was wrong. Rather than ascribe to me legal advice that I don't give, just admit that you're wrong.
I have never "overstated, misinterpreted,and distorted the "Pullman decision" over the years" because I disagree with it and think it's stupid. But it is the law.
You remain wrong about people being able to own a coop as tenants in common. Any RE attorney on here will agree with me.
"Buy a $1MM co-op, put 20% down = $200,000. Lose 90% of equity means equity down to $20K and apartment down to $820K, so the apartment is down 18%."
Except he put down more than 20%. Don't know exactly how much.
"Ironically, if you've lost your job, blown through your savings, and can't afford your apartment, you're in a much better position as an OWNER (at least now, with all the banks being overwhelmed with foreclosures), because the process of being forced out of an apartment you own but have stopped paying the mortgage is much, much longer than being forced out of an apartment on which you've stopped paying rent."
Except that, as owner, you've lost your savings. I don't view that as much of an advantage.
never bother matt with facts.
Yah, cc. Matt is immune to factuality.
People this is no more a buying problem than a renting problem. It's New York City life.
"Not in a co-op it's not. It's the exact same procedure as eviction: call the sheriff. "
Sheriffs play exactly NO PART of any eviction in NYC; perhaps you meant City Marshall? But even with Marshalls, all they do is EXECUTE evictions AFTER an Order of Eviction is issued in Landlord Tenant Court or and Order of Ejectment in State Supreme.
"Cant be evicted from a co-op unless you dont pay maintenance which is a fraction of the rent in a rental."
Nope. The fastest of any of the things which can be done is a Coop Foreclosure by the Lender (faster than any eviction or a Judicial Foreclosure on Real Estate). Then the Lender does a Holdover eviction.
"Well, kylewest, you would be wrong:
http://www.cooperator.com/articles/871/1/Push-and-Pullman/Page1.html
The Pullman decision grants co-ops the right to evict tenants under the business judgment rule, without judicial review. There is no winding through the courts for co-ops. Condominiums are another matter, as there's no lease."
And exactly how long did it take that Coop to evict Mr.Pullman? If I recall correctly, it was about 3 years. Yup, much faster than a rental tenant... NOT!!!!!!! Also, Pullman IS NOT USED in a non-payment, ever. It is used for non-monetary evictions when you have a nuisance tenant. And in a lot of buildings, part of the process is having a special meeting of all the shareholders and getting a super-majority of them to vote for it. Not exactly a quicky.
"Frequently, the co-operative corporation has a right of first refusal Right of First Refusal
In general, the right of a person or company to purchase something before the offering is made available to others.
"http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Borrower+beware:+Most+co-op+foreclosures+get+fast-tracked-a065227644"
snippet: "Frequently, the co-operative corporation has a right of first refusal Right of First Refusal on the shares, which means that they have the first right to buy the shares from the lender, usually at book value. This type of restriction has been upheld by the courts."
This article from the "Free Library" is worth what you paid for it.
"Boards nip problems in the bud, won't tolerate b.s. from bad neighbors,"
Not in lots of buildings. There have been myriad instances of noise complaints and other nuisances where Boards have opted "not to get in the middle of things" between neighbors. And even if they want to, they can't just waive their magic wands and have stuff happen, even though they think they can and their attorneys tell them they can do whatever they want.
columbiacounty
about 4 hours ago
ignore this person
report abuse
hfscomm1---shove it.
Very good, remember to use nasty terms but not curses. Your abundant curses, the f-word in particular, were deleted by streeteasy last week.
Anyway, reading the above, once again, I wasn't needed to degrade the quality of discourse on this tread - congratulations for doing that on your own, how many was that this Sunday?
> All these horror stories are from RENTERS.
Who were able to get out... often easily.
If you buy the place... whoops.
Getting back to the op, are people actually agreeing with the premise? It's pretty laughable.