Co-Op taxes reduced if apartments combined?

When you change the number of units, you change the rental buildings the city uses as comparables to your co-op. The city's site says: "We use a statistical model as a tool to find typical income and expenses for similar properties to yours (in terms of size, location, number of units and age). Then we apply a formula to the income data to get to your Market Value. The law requires that we value co-ops and condos as if they were a rental buildings, even though they are not income producing."

Problem is, reducing the number of units -- making the average unit larger in the calculations -- could work against you.

The co-op needs to hire a tax certiorari lawyer to decide whether it's worth pursuing. You'd pay a percentage of the taxes saved.

uhm if someone does this successfully I'd really like to see it.

we've combined 3 apartments in an 8 (originally) so that there are now only 6 apartments.......did it change the tax bill NOPE.

anyone actually done this and saved money before?

I want to bump this. I think its technically possible. Does anyone know the percent that taxes could get reduced if a building applies for the reduction in units?

Background info on how coop taxes are determined are based detailed at:

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dof/html/property/property_condo_coop_comp_rental.shtml

I believe your coop would have to hire a law firm that specializes in appealing the building's real estate taxes. The valuation of the building is based upon comparable rental buildings. The number of apartments within a building is just one of many factors that go into the valuation....

The spreadsheets listing all the city's co-ops, and the rental buildings they're compared to as one factor in determining taxes, are on the Department of Finance's site.

You could pick up the one for your borough, and find 19-unit co-ops whose other factors are the same as yours. Then look up those co-op's taxes to see whether they're more or less than yours.

Keep in mind, though, there's probably a money reason why co-ops never reduce the number of units in the DoF's records. Mine hasn't, and neither have lots of other buildings in my neighborhood that're full of combos. Maybe they're just lazy, or their tax certiorari lawyers never thought of it, or something, but I doubt it.

Thanks jelj13 and NWT...very helpful!!