square foot measurement

Sorry - here's the link to the NYTimese article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/nyregion/12apartment.html?ref=realestate

Lucille - just in case you haven't figured it out yet, CC is chasing you because at some point you engaged in an argument with AR on SE. CC chases, or rather "trolls" anyone who at any time doesn't agree with AR on the SE board.

countdown now - 5,4,3,2

you take that back you filthy liar. columbiacounty loves me. i know, because he tells me so in my dreams where i keep him locked up in my recently acquired jersey basement, and where we make old fashioned pop corn and watch eric rohmer movies without subtitles. they teach us valuable lessons. he doesn't speak french, but i whisper the general gist softly in his ear.

I think the whole square foot thing is over blown.
We already know that most spaces are rounded up a little too far.
Most places in NYC are not so unique that the apartment above or below might be the same so a little hunting will yeild the the range of claims.
That's why you go and see them. I guess if you were really serious you could hire some one to measure the inside space for acurate living space and then debate the inside out question.
I guess what we hate is outragious errors in spacial judgement.

come on, hall monitor, let this one live. i've got a rohmer reference! that's gold!

Falco - I agree. IMHO this buyer is just looking, very late in the game, for a discount on the price he already negotiated and contracted for. And the damages????? WTF ?

sounds like a shakedown he hopes will fall through the cracks.

Maly posted the same article elsewhere at about the same time.

The federal trade commission is supposed to be watching for false advertising but they have been inactive for over 20 years now.

I would love to see the brokers get snagged on this. There is an apt in my building that is 740 sq ft that's being sold as 900. It's just fraud. I can't figure out why this stuff wasn't prosecuted years ago.

I agree with the shakedown theory. The suit (going since 2007) costs the Bhandaris nothing. In the meantime they've asked the court to prevent the sponsor renting out 3T, asked for all-new appliances since the existing new ones were used by previous renters, and on and on. Responding to the endless motions is costing the sponsor. The frivolous suit is costing us.

The 1137 ft² includes the outside walls (thick in an old-building conversion like this,) the hallway walls and half the adjoining-unit walls. All that's spelled out in the offering plan and condo declaration. Anyone but a moron paying $700K would read those. The marketing was full of the usual "stated ft² is not usable ft²" disclaimers.

If Mr. Bhandari wins, I don't think this case will have much impact on the industry practice of exaggerating square footage. The issue here isn't that the dimensions of an existing unit were misreported. It's that the Sponsor didn't deliver a product that matched the prospectus. That's a serious breach, but it's only loosely related to the wider problem.

"The 1137 ft² includes the outside walls (thick in an old-building conversion like this,) the hallway walls and half the adjoining-unit walls. All that's spelled out in the offering plan and condo declaration. Anyone but a moron paying $700K would read those. The marketing was full of the usual "stated ft² is not usable ft²" disclaimers."

NO! That's really not acceptable for a product that's being sold to a consumer ... maybe it flies for commercial tenants, and maybe not. But it's the equivalent of labeling a box of corn flakes not merely with a "some settling" warning, but with the total weight of all the raw ingredients that were involved in the manufacture of the product -- corn husks, corn silk, cobs, sugar cane pulp, etc. Nobody cares about anything but the actual usable capacity. For residences, that's from the interior of the most recent coat of paint (or the flocking on the chinoise red velvet wallcovering) inwards.

Alan -- Sometimes there are people who are inside of walls, although they are not alive (or at least not for long). So maybe there should be two disclosures for square footage -- one for potential murderers and the other for regular folks.

they don't make walls thick enough to hide a whole body anymore. trust me.

Maybe it's POV.
For years I over estimated it's size and the delusion gave me comfort and confidence.
I restricted my activities to female residential re brokers.
Needless to say, with them judging size, I was a legend.
I later dated a gal studying actuarial science. Their capacity for accurate measure is extraordinary.
I never fully regained my confidence.
VIA LA ILLUSION!

"one for potential murderers and the other for regular folks" ... oh, as if there's any difference between.

aww, falco, she probably rounded down for historical average purposes. spiteful bitch.

The Bhandaris have settled with TwoTrees. Deposit back with interest, plus $150K.

Both sides agreed that the 1137 ft² was accurate. Issue became the 109 ft² difference in size of main living area, which I guess means between advertised and real dimensions.

here's the link to the NYT article.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/06/nyregion/06square.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=nyregion
So the Bhandaris basically won, but it is interesting that Two Trees gave the $150,000 (out of court) rather than the discount the buyers wanted.

Guess they didn't want this case to start a trend with their other purchasers.