Lawyers - do you look at c of o?

I am not an attorney, and I have no idea if an attorney would review this- but this is an extremely easy thing to lookup. If you go to the NYC Dept. of Buildings website- there is a building lookup tool- you plug in the address- and you have all the relevant building filing info at your fingertips- including the certificate of occupancy.

I bought a place and later found out that there is no c of o - the question is - should my lawyer alerted me to it? by him not knowing about it, is he negligent?

If the building is in the City of New York and was built prior to 1938, without any major change of use subsequent to that year, a CofO is not required or expected.

THe building was built prior to 1938, but boiler room changed to living space in the 80s. Sellers claim that they got a c of o, but the city doesn't have anything on record. The question is - was my lawyer expected to find that out during due diligence? was he negligent for not finding out?

If you think you were injured by your lawyer not researching the building's undocumented construction history, then you could ask another lawyer whether you have a case.

Thanks NWT, that's exactly what I'm trying to do here - is it common practice to locate the c of o?

Remember 1B, the half-cellar one you you looked at at 9 E 97th? That building never got a new CO when it was reconfigured in 1986. There's an old 1925 CO. Yet apartments have been selling for 30 years, with nobody het up enough to make a stink.

No idea. My building didn't have one when it converted in 1991, but it was disclosed in the offering plan. It matters to banks lending on new-construction apartments, but doesn't seem to be a big deal otherwise.

NWT - interesting, I didn't know. That said, I ended up purchasing a different apartment and had no idea that there was no c of o and expected my lawyer to b on top of it, which wasn't the case. The question is - should he have pointed it out? he says that he took the sellers representation as is, to me, that is negligent.

I wouldn't take anything a seller said on faith, so if the building having a CO mattered in your case, I would've confirmed it.

Keep in mind that "negligent" is a loaded word. You could say he wasn't as painstaking as you think he might have been, but that's it.

Going forward, it'd be just as well for the co-op to get a new CO that reflects the 1980s changes in use and occupancy. All the shareholders would bear the cost of that. You could demand that your lawyer cover your share. After giggle-spitting his coffee all over your e-mail, he'll say either yes or no.

Why should the co-op pay for this? and it's not that simple, current configuration is not up to current code. Complicated situation.

The co-op should pay for it because it owns the building.

If you as a shareholder make a change that requires a new CO, then the alteration agreement has you pay for it.

If the co-op sponsor did the conversion of the boiler room, then the co-op could try to get the sponsor (if still around) to pay for it. Not likely.

If a shareholder later bought additional shares and expanded into the old boiler room, and if there was an alteration agreement that says the shareholder bears the cost of any required CO, then the agreement would also say any successor shareholder would inherit that obligation. That'd be you.

Don't worry about current code. Owners of old buildings don't usually have to make them compliant every time the code changes. If they did, most of the city would be razed and rebuilt every few years.

Who's raising the CO issue? You or the co-op?

Me. I need to renovate and can't get permits without.

Then you have to jump into the city quagmire and pay for it. The co-op will end up with a nice new CO for free.

You could try to sue your lawyer, claiming you wouldn't have bought had you known there was no CO, but be careful. It'd could cost you lots of money, take many years, and get you nowhere.

If your lawyer took $1 of yours out of his escrow account, he'd be disbarred pretty much instantly, but the subjective question of whether he had a duty to check whether there was a CO, is another story. I'd chalk the additional reno expense up to the vicissitudes of life, and move on.

Marcie:

1. it probably is not common practice
2. but it is mandatory when dealing with property that needs a special c of o

3. but your title company might also have scrwed up