Manhattan Maintenance Fees in 2017
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Manhattan Maintenance Fees in 2017 Neighborhood Breakdown, from For-Sale Posts on nytimes.com Compiled by Steve Wolgast • [email protected] Average monthly maintenance fee per square foot by neighborhood in 2017average $1.17 x ‡ Manhattan in 2006, ’08, ’12, ’17 2017 median 2006 2008 2012 Tudor City $2.56 x ‡ $2.42 Midtown East ‡ ‡ $2.30 Clinton (Hell’s Kitchen) x ‡ 2 x ‡ $2.27 Upper East Side ‡ 2 $2.15 Sutton Place ‡‡ 4 1 x ф ‡ $2.15 Upper West Side ‡ 2 ‡ $2.12 Carnegie Hill (East Harlem) ‡ ‡ $2.12 Chelsea ‡ x ‡ $2.09 West Village ‡ Lenox Hill $2.09 x ‡ $2.08 Murray Hill ‡ ‡ $2.06 Greenwich Village x ‡ 1 ‡ $2.02 Lincoln Square (UWS) ‡ $2.02 Grammercy Park x ‡‡ Union Square $1.90 ‡ $1.85 Kips Bay ‡ 1 ‡ $1.76 Manhattan Valley (UWS) ‡ NoHo $1.74 ‡ Flatiron ‡ $1.72 Financial District $1.57 TriBeCa5 x $1.55 x ‡ $1.53 East Village ‡ Morningside Heights5 $1.43 Roosevelt Island $1.29 ‡ $1.28 SoHo ‡ x ‡ $1.21 Hudson Heights x ‡ $1.13 ‡ Harlem x ‡ Notes 1. These neighborhoods were of UWS ‡ $1.13 Inwood x ‡ category in 2006 and 2008. ‡ $1.12 2. These neighborhoods were part of Lower East Side UES category in 2006 and 2008. $1.08 3. These neighborhoods were part of Sugar Hill WaHi category in 2006 and 2008. Hamilton Heights x ‡ $1.03 4. UWS average when Lincoln Square ‡ and Manhattan Valley are included, Lower WaHi3 x ‡ $0.96 as they were in 2006 and 2008 ‡ surveys. 3 ‡ $0.90 Audubon Park ‡ 5. Insufficient data for both neighbor- hoods in 2008 and 2012. 3 ‡ $0.89 Fort George ‡ $0.25 $0.50 $0.75 $1.00 $1.25 $1.50 $1.75 $2.00 $2.25 $2.50 thepinehurst.org/on-the-market • 1 As maintenance fees rise steadily, Tudor City leads list By Steve Wolgast • [email protected] likely that any apartment pays one of those numbers ex- actly because they are derived from a large set. So keep You’re asking yourself, Is my maintenance fee too high? in mind that each neighborhood has a range of fees. That’s the question I get every time I share this Making things more complicated, while each co-op glimpse into maintenance fees by neighborhood. has one maintenance fee rate per share, the number of You’ve just looked at a chart that shows how much shares can vary by apartment even when several apart- owners pay on average per square foot to cover their ments share the same floor plan. Maintenance fees are co-ops’ costs, with reports from four years from 2006 charged by the number of shares, and an apartment through 2017. If the specific years — 2006, ’08, ’12 and with more amenities typically has more shares allocated ’17 — appear to be selected randomly, you’re right. The to it than one the same size one floor below but with usual changes in commitment have kept me from doing fewer amenities. For For the source data, go to the survey on a regular basis. example, higher floors thepinehurst.org/on-the-market Even so, this fourth survey confirms the general re- and download Maint 2017.pdf have more shares than sults from previous years. Midtown co-ops charge the lower floors, street views most, behind only Tudor City, which appears for the are more valuable than alley views, and so on. first time (too little data previously). Those in Upper You’ll see that for 2017 and 2012 the fees are listed Manhattan and the on Lower East Side charge the least. by both averages and medians. The median fee helps to One change is the movement of Clinton up the list. filter outliers, those few extravagantly expensive build- So is your maintenance too high? ings or an unbelievably inexpensive one that pulls the You won’t find the answer here. That’s because the average up or down in a way that may not reflect what individual monthly maintenance fees that make up the most people pay in a neighborhood. source data come from real estate listings that rarely ex- Here’s an example of a low fee, one that helps bring plain what kind of amenities or expenses each building the average fee in SoHo down a bit lower than the me- charges for. In some buildings the maintenance fee pays dian. Because if you think that paying $1 a month in for doormen on duty 24/7 and porters along with a gym maintenance for a 3,000 square-foot apartment is a and on-site parking. In others, the fee is lower where misprint, here’s the background. The co-op rents out the only amenity is a super, and some have a super who the first floor to retail space, which on West Broadway works only part-time. attracts a business with a healthy profit margin. Co-op A few buildings include capital expenses in their owners “receive 10 percent retail ownership and income maintenance fee (such as the cost of replacing a roof), from two stores totaling 7,500 square feet of prime re- while others use assessments for that kind of expense— tail space,” according to the listing. and assessments aren’t included in this survey. What’s That rental revenue gives co-op owners a nice benefit. more, some buildings receive income from retail stores The rate paid by the owner of the apartment for sale or offices whose occupants pay rent to the co-op, revenue comes to 0.03¢ per square foot per month, for an an- that reduces the burden on owners by supplementing a nual grand total of $12. co-op’s income without having to collect from owners. And here’s an example from the opposite end. If you On top of that, the maintenance fee listed for each decided you wanted to live on the Upper East Side, neighborhood, both the median and the average, is on Fifth Avenue, perhaps, with a pleasant view of The based on a set of fees for each neighborhood. It’s un- Pond in the park, and if you decided you wanted a build- ing that made life as pleasant for you as possible, you may decide to make a home in the Sherry Netherland Method by buying your own little corner. The purchase price Each weekend in 2017 I went to The New York Times’ is steep—if you have you ask, well … you know—and online real estate page and searched for Manhattan co- there’s a maintenance fee to match: $7.26 per square ops, adjusting the results to show the most-recently listed foot, more than triple the neighborhood average, and apartments first. Then I recorded the square footage and the monthly closer to four times its median fee. The apartment listed maintenance fee of the first ten apartments that provided runs 850 square feet. Do the math and you’ll find the them (about one-third omit the size or fee or both) and monthly charge at $5,989, and you’ll still need to set a the neighborhood, including addresses and, when it was bit aside: Your $71,868 a year probably doesn’t include provided, the apartment number. the doorman’s holiday tip. After reaching ten, I looked for apartments in my co- Wherever you live, when you review the chart and op’s neighborhood, Hudson Heights, as well as Inwood, compare the figures to your own rate, you’ll realize Fort George, and Lower Washington Heights, until I had right away that you’re sizing up apples and oranges: you five more. That’s why Upper Manhattan is represented at pay based on the number of shares you own, not by the a higher frequency in the source data than other places. At the end of the year I found the average and median length and width of your apartment. fee for each neighborhood with at least six sales, and on The challenge is that real estate listings show apart- the chart compare them to previous results. ments based on size, not by their share count. Determ- ing your apartment’s size and you’re all set. 2 • thepinehurst.org/on-the-market.