Air Rights

A prior discussion on this topic:

http://streeteasy.com/nyc/talk/discussion/18699-air-rights

a lawyer once told me it's virtually impossible to guarantee air rights. that said if there is no planned construction on a site at the moment i think you can feel pretty safe. no one built there in the boom of the 00's and a boom like that won't come around again for some time. and even then it would take a few years to get the permits, plans, funds, etc.

i'm more concerned with my right to go up a floor than the risk of my view being altered by others' construction

Co-op, condo, or house?

If co-op, I can help you with a list of things to consider. I bought roof rights, with limited development rights, from my co-op last year.

Lad,
wow that sounds like a great offer, I would love to know more about some of what you went thru and learnt from the process when you get time. Thanks Gabrielle

List of things to consider:

1) Is the building willing to sell? And what's their price? We lucked out in that the space we wanted to buy was completely inaccessible to any other apartment in the building and could not even practically be used as a common element.

2) Is the roof capable of supporting the weight load? Even in modern buildings, this can be an issue. The DOB code has changed a lot in 20 years. A weight load that was fine in 1990, when our neighbors did a similar project, was not in 2011. We had to triple all of the joists and add an end-to-end steel beam.

3) Does the building have available FAR? You're allowed a bulkhead of certain minimum dimensions for "free," but anything beyond that requires available FAR.

4) If you have FAR, are there other height or fire code issues? Our building is only allowed to be 40', per fire code, because we have one common entrance and exit. We had, by this point, already decided against building additional living space, so we did not pursue whether exceptions could be granted if we could come up with a separate fire plan for the addition.

5) Do the modifications you're making require bringing up the rest of your apartment to current code? Again, we live in a modern building, but we were required to do a pretty major electrical update and a staircase enlargement because current code is very different than 1968 code.

6) Does the building have available shares to issue? Our co-op did have shares in the treasury, so we needed a "no-action" letter from the Attorney General's office (which was surprisingly quick and efficient). If we did not have shares, we would've had to apply to the AG to issue more shares, which is more complicated. I understand that this is much more complicated in condos, where every owner technically owns a portion of the common elements, v. a co-op where the corporation owns everything.

If you can get past all of that -- and we spent about $25k just to get to the "yes or no" point -- other things to think about are....

1) How are you going to get the stuff you need up there? For us, it meant two crane visits and street-blocking permits. Not cheap.

2) How much is all of this going to cost v. just buying what you already wanted? I'm actually horrified by how much we spent, but it's very hard to find 300 square feet of roof space with open Empire State views and firework views. We looked for three years before we bought this place and were confident we couldn't buy what we were building, even if the job went 100% over budget (which it did).

3) How much is this going to impact your lives. My significant other and I went through, bar none, the worst period in our relationship during the construction. And that was with living in a sublet, not in a construction zone.

4) How much is this going to annoy your neighbors. I will owe favors to everyone in the building for as long as I live here. The construction was way worse and way longer than anyone thought, and I do legitimately feel guilty about the impact on everyone else (even if the co-op financials are much better due to the one-time purchase fee and the additional ongoing maintenance).

We're in the final days of construction, and I have to say, I would NEVER do this again. Do I regret doing it? Hard to say, and probably not. But never, ever, ever again.

Did they let you operate the crane? Because that would make it all worthwhile to me.

lad - how do you see the Macy's fireworks?
I was so bummed when they moved from the East River , but I can't see how you would see it from ChelseaA

And just asking, I know you have gone through hell with adding the upper deck space, but do you think that you would ever recoup the cost of this addition? (kill me know for asking)

Kill me 'now" for asking

why don't you take care of that yourself?

ph41, the fireworks in the Hudson start in the teens.

We're going to refinance within the next 60 days, so we'll see what the appraisal says.... The apartment has a lot of very hard-to-find features, especially for the price point, but also a lot of polarizing features.

Based on the very few comps available from the past couple of years, I *think* we'll do OK in terms of at least breaking even. But who knows... for now, I'm just glad it's (almost) over.

Oh my goodness, lad thank you for such a comprehensive and organized outline - I love your attention to detail.

That was very generous and kind of you to share your experience, to shine the light for those of us considering it.

Congratulations getting thru that process, what a steep learning curve.

I just got off a plane (to Australia) half jet lagged and it put such a smile on my face to read your post, Thank you it has given me a lot to think about, and so nice to get information from first hand experience !

FYI! This is a must watch, and hopefully, it will answer your questions.

http://www.ny1.com/content/157030/air-rights-can-send-price-of-property-soaring

Agreed. Lad, great post. I hope your job ends soon and that you resume normal life.

Predictable that @ph41 would immediately slither in to feature that she too is a special penthouse dweller (albeit in a C building on the fringe of Murray Hill!). Oh the eliteness of it all. I'm overcome with envy.

Wanted to follow up on this. How did the appraisal go? Will you be able to recoup the cost if you were to sell?