Ground floor unit on RSD - what's a fair discount?

Rats are definitely an issue. Buildings are constantly battling to keep them out.

Get a cat. Seriously.

Vermin can sense the presence of a feline (they can even smell the "markings" that cats leave behind after brushing against walls, furniture, and doorjambs), and will avoid the space.

Cats also feast on cockroaches, and somehow (unless the building is SO infested they're literally bursting out of the walls) also sense the presence of a cat, and unless they're really desperate for food or water (they're attracted more by moisture than food, which is why you should wipe up every little splash around the kitchen sink and never leave dishes sitting in the sink with even a trace of standing water), will also avoid the space.

Check out where they put the garbage, both inside and outside the building. In addition to infestations, it is a noise issue if the garbage truck is outside your bedroom window at 4 am twice a week.

Riverside Drive is rat infested. They come out at night.

There are plenty of people who will tell a broker, "Don't even show me a ground floor apartment." There is an old time prejudice against them. In fact, even places with nice private backyards just are having trouble attracting buyer interest, at least in my hands. One guy told me it's the fear of break-ins more than anything else.

If you love it, and it's not primarily an investment for you but rather primarily a home, then I would bid AGGRESSIVELY because unless attitudes change, you will not enjoy the same long-term appreciation rate as your neighbors in the upper floors of that building. Your home is an investment whether you like it or not. From an investment standpoint, you need one hell of a deal.

I actually think that maisonettes are charming & I don't think that I'm alone; I'd also say that the fact that you have a view from a maisonette is a plus. It sounds charming. An exterminator told me that if you keep rodents out of the basement, you pretty much keep them out of the building so see what the building does for routine maintenance &, as stated, find out where that garbage is kept.

4 years ago I bought a ground floor and cellar duplex new construction apartment in Harlem. I keep the apartment extremely clean and dry and have minimal issues with insects and no issues with rodents. Other apartments in the building have reported issues with both (particularly after digging started on a new construction townhouse next door). The minimal problems I have had with insects have been limited to ants in the summer (which was very easy to control) and centipedes in the cellar space (controllable via the exterminator). The super used to let the exterminator into various apartments- and confided in me that the apartments reporting problems with insects and rodents usually did not keep their apartments clean and/or dry.

I am not sure if there is a behavioral difference between city mice and country mice- but I grew up in Rockland County (not quite the country)- and had plenty of field mice making their way into the house. We had a cat and that surely did not stop them (although the cat was a good mouser). This is NYC- there are rats everywhere- Riverside Drive is not unique. Seal up all gaps in the apartment- particularly where pipes come into the apartment. If you do this and keep things clean and dry you should have very little problems.

If noise is a concern- look into citiquiet windows (or it's competitors) and some of these companies also do soundproof doors.

As for the market for ground floor apartments-I realize I am in the minority- but there are value seekers like myself that seek a bigger bang for the buck. My apartment was priced identical to a 5th story unit (we are an elevator 6 story building) with identical common charges and taxes. My apartment has 30-35% more usable square ft than the 5th story apartment and it's not a cookie cutter layout. My building also has a few brokers that bought into the building and they all told me (when we met at the first owners meeting) that they had several interested buyers lined up if I backed out/couldn't close. If I met them prior to going into contract- I wouldn't have believed that there were so many interested parties- but they told me this after I closed.

What Fluter said - make sure you get a big discount, because ground floor apartments have trouble selling even at the best of times. Back in the day ('06), I remember a C6 on the ground floor on a quiet block of well-maintained buildings, good school zone, access to CP that had trouble selling for under 1.2m. C6s in the same line were selling for over 2m.

Thanks for the comments everyone.

Like a true gonzo, I went up there last night and did some recon on my own. Spoke to another tenant on the ground floor and found out there is definitely a mice/waterbug problem on this floor. Apparently the ground floor in this building is the lowest floor in the building due to the way it was constructed (nearly 100 years ago), and these apartments lack any kind of sub-flooring as well. The tenant I spoke to had tried numerous means of dealing with the problem, but to no avail. The super also lives on the same level and has experienced the same issues that even he has not been able to resolve. The tenant even called up the former resident of the apartment in question, who said there were at least 4 mice discovered last year (tenant had at least 6-7), along with a waterbug problem; I plan on talking to him as well but it looks like this deal is out of the question for me.

The point is - caveat emptor - ALWAYS do as much research as possible before rushing into contract. Had I not taken it upon myself to do some investigative reporting, I may be have been stuck with an apartment with an uncontrollable pest infestation. As buyers, it behooves us to uncover all possible flaws/negatives, even if this means knocking on random peoples' doors and grilling them about building conditions. By speaking to a long time resident of the building, I not only found out about the rodent/bug problem, but also that two people had been murdered in this building some years ago, that apparently garbage is stored INSIDE the building until it is moved on trash day, and that one ground floor tenant even found a RAT once. These are things you might never find out until you moved in, and they are certainly things that the seller's broker won't reveal to you. Do your research, educate yourself, and make sure you have all the facts before laying down that 10%.

troymclure - Too many people talk themselves into making a bad decision, which was the direction your first post had taken. Good move by investigating further. Very surprising to hear the super and other tenants being so frank with you. I guess you don't know until you ask.

Hopefully you'll find some better inventory coming on line in the near future. Good luck.

any updates on this topic?