Public records in NYC closing prices?

SE picks up the closing price from the city, then matches it to the listing.

You can always look at a building's closings on ACRIS. Those go back only to 2004 for co-ops. For condos and land, they go back many decades, but for older ones you have to calculate the closing amounts from the taxes paid.

https://www.urbandigs.com - SE has them, cityrealty has it, urbandigs has it, after that its a matter of what NWT says, merging the sale with rls listing info and on top of that its listing discount/days on mkt, stats like that which can vary from site to site based on how each cleansed the integrity issues within rls..rls is basically the mls of Manhattan, stands for rebny listing service and is how brokers share listing info in manhattan

thanks but I think I need an acronym key. Can you go by the tax assessment/property assessment. Is it me or does everyone have a vested interest in propping up prices... brokers / check; the city / check ... they all have a vested interest in getting you to over spend on a house or get you to think something's more value than what it is. Incidentally Harley prices in the last few years are unreal for brownstone if I'm reading this correctly. Like literally 1 10 bagger from a house! =O

*Harlem prices

ACRIS is http://a836-acris.nyc.gov/CP/

By "taxes paid" I meant the RE transaction tax paid when a deed is recorded. On an old condo deed you'll find a stamp where the amounts were written in. Take the biggest amount and divide by 0.004 and you'll get the closing price upon which tax was paid.

That's just for old stuff, which is no good for the current market anyway. For anything in recent years, ACRIS has an explicit closing amount.

Or just wait for SE to pick up the sale, and it'll show on the building's Past Sales page.

It must be a broker run sight. Why is it that everything I've been looking at in central harlem according to Street Easy has been sold for 100,000 of dollars more than the assessment according to acris? Unless buying a multi-family in the 130s is going out of style -- I don't get it. Strangely it is always some LLC as the new buyer so I guess maybe I can believe it ... I am totally confused about these prices in this area especially above 130 street.

ACRIS doesn't show assessed value. It just shows sales and anything else having to do with title to the property. For assessed value and quarterly RE taxes you go somewhere else on the Department of Finance's site.

You'll very rarely see a property change hands for assessed value.

E.g., a house might be assessed at its value as a multi-family, by whatever byzantine method the city uses, but a buyer who plans on turning it into single-family or condos would pay more for it than a buyer who'd keep it as multi-family.

but generally speaking I take it a house sells for less than its appraised value?

I don't whether sales prices correspond to appraisals. The appraiser probably looks at similar recent sales in the neighborhood to come up with comparables.

Or by appraised value do you mean assessed value?

The city assesses but doesn't appraise the same way an appraiser would.

E.g., 259 W 121 St. which just sold for $1,660,000. It has eight RS apartments. The city says its "Estimated market value" is $275,000, and its "Billable assessed value" is $54,900. I don't know how it comes up with those numbers, but for larger buildings the owner files a statement of income and expenses, and the city goes by that.

Or look at http://www.masseyknakal.com/listingimages/setup/pdf/131_West_119th_Street.pdf, assessed at only $39,000 but asking $3,200,000.

Numbers generated for tax purposes are not meaningful approximations of market value here in NYC. In other parts of the USA, yes, the city's assessment of the property's value is very close to what the house will sell for. But not here.

appraisals by brokers may as well be written on toilet paper

yes by appraised value I meant assessed value.
hmm appraised value $39,000 but asking $3.2M ??? This is what I'm confused about. I think with some of the brownstones uptown --flippers buy total pieces of junk; do a gut renovation; and now they're worth Millions ...yeah OK...

Assessed Value is only a percentage of Market Value, and Market Value is determined different ways depending upon the class of property. It will hardly ever come close to what the property would sell for.

The city has all kinds of info on how property taxes are determined, e.g. http://www1.nyc.gov/site/finance/taxes/property-determining-your-assessed-value.page

If you're looking at multi-family property, RE taxes are or could be a big chunk of your expenses, so worthwhile to read up on it.

?

hmm appraised value $39,000 "
... NO, assessed value = $39,000. The only purpose at all for assessed value is to calculate real estate taxes.

Harlem brownstones haven't sold for $39,000 since (perhaps) the early 1980s.