Summary of sales to date at Sabrina (240 West 98th / 241 West 97th)

The prices listed above are insider prices. Individuals that purchased apartments from insiders paid significantly higher prices then what is listed above.

I think there are three types of sales on that list. The majority are sponsor sales to insiders. There also appear to be several sponsor sales to apparent outsiders, like 2A, 10A, 12D, 13E, 11H, 8K, 4L and 5N. Lastly, there are the two flips, 4D and 14M.

10025uw: You seem to be suggesting that there have been other sales at higher prices. That seems unlikely, unless you mean contracts that haven't closed yet.

Good luck to them. Have you ever seen those apartments? I wouldn't live there for any price.

I toured the building with one of the Rachel Realty brokers this summer. The broker interaction was a distinctly unpleasant experience, even as broker interactions go. After 50+ years of deferred maintenance, the building is a sad reflection of what it once had been. Thanks to rent control / stabilization and the unfortunate location, which had only recently become acceptable to the types of people that can buy into a condo conversion.

The building definitely offered a lot of space for the money and the option to customize your apartment's finishes. We saw some of the work in progress and I can't say it was too horrible. Not very high end, but suitable for families with young children who will trash the place anyway. But I'm afraid that the Sabrina is saddled with a legacy that will be difficult to overcome. I'm not sure how many RC/RS tenants live there, but from the look if it there are quite a few insiders -- thanks, West81, for the ACRIS data dump. Besides, one can be sure that as soon as ("if" may be more appropriate word these days) the conversion is complete, all sorts of infrastructure will start failing. Gas and water risers, roof, windows, facade are likely to demand payback from the new owners for years of neglect. It will take enormous investment and many years to bring out the old luster.

Back in the summer, the pricing was not compelling enough. It is even less so now given the direction the market has taken. Priced almost as high as prime UWS didn't do the trick back then, it certainly won't do the trick now that the corner of 97th and B'way is likely to regain "marginal" status.

I toured the building with one of the Rachel Realty brokers this summer. The broker interaction was a distinctly unpleasant experience, even as broker interactions go. After 50+ years of deferred maintenance, the building is a sad reflection of what it once had been. Thanks to rent control / stabilization and the unfortunate location, which had only recently become acceptable to the types of people that can buy into a condo conversion.

The building definitely offered a lot of space for the money and the option to customize your apartment's finishes. We saw some of the work in progress and I can't say it was too horrible. Not very high end, but suitable for families with young children who will trash the place anyway. But I'm afraid that the Sabrina is saddled with a legacy that will be difficult to overcome. I'm not sure how many RC/RS tenants live there, but from the look if it there are quite a few insiders -- thanks, West81, for the ACRIS data dump. Besides, one can be sure that as soon as ("if" may be more appropriate word these days) the conversion is complete, all sorts of infrastructure will start failing. Gas and water risers, roof, windows, facade are likely to demand payback from the new owners for years of neglect. It will take enormous investment and many years to bring out the old luster.

Back in the summer, the pricing was not compelling enough. It is even less so now given the direction the market has taken. Priced almost as high as prime UWS didn't do the trick back then, it certainly won't do the trick now that the corner of 97th and B'way is likely to regain "marginal" status.

I'd be interested in hearing from uws_buyer, who closed in October, about how the Sabrina is working out for him and his family.

Either the ACRIS records above have compromised the "uws_buyer" pseudonym or he has been enjoying his new family home way too much to read and post on Streeteasy :-) Let's hope it's the latter and best of luck!

West 81, aptometrist: I posted today on 'value of a terrace' thread. Yes, I've been enjoying. :-)

Hope you're both well.

Forgive my ignorance--what does an "insider" mean in this case? . . . and am I reading the resale on 14M correctly?. . . WOW and OUCH ! ! !

You missed another flip - 14L. The renters at 14L assigned their right to buy 14L at the price of 841kish for 300kish. Nice work.

princetonbabe: "Insiders" are tenants in residence at the time of the offering. They have a short-lived exclusive right to buy their apartments (90 days?), generally at a discount. At Sabrina, the insider discounts were fairly deep, but not deep enough for flips to yield much profit after the market turned.

I have a request: Could we let this thread die? Even better, could the site admin delete it? I was too lazy to cut the names out of that report, and although the information is public, it doesn't serve any purpose now that Streeteasy has the history.

"Forgive my ignorance--what does an "insider" mean in this case? "

An insider is a formerly rent stabilized tenant who gets a chance to buy the unit they're living in, usually at a significant discount over market rates, allowing them to make a killing, if they can sell the unit later at market rates. There are lots of tricky issues to work through with these conversions.

* Have enough insiders bought their units so that the owners will not face huge increases in common charges in the future?

* What is the rental income from the rent stabilized tenants who remain in the building?

* How much maintenance has to be done and how much money has the developer allocated to do the work?

Conversions like this would keep me up at night. They may work at fine or they may not. Just part of the board game, "New York Real Estate - You pays your money and yous take your chances"

I knew many of the people in this building and glancing at two of the names that got the best bargains...well they don't sound like the names of the folks who I knew were living there at the time of the conversion. Something seems a bit fishy to me.

I definitely know that at least one of the people was not an insider but their name appears on sales list with the insider price. How did that happen?