Newsday from New York, New York • 55

NYC 'Real Estate C3 flQQQQQ BOsOPQ co Apartment Sales and Prices Are Looking Up in the City irt 5 By Joe Catalano CONDO AND CO-OP sales in Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn continue to improve according to market surveys released by taro Manhattan real estate brokers The Corcoran that the price of luxury condos and co-ops in Manhattan rose 21 percent during the first six months of this year The average price per room for a luxury unit increased to $85402 at the end of June up feom $83646 in December Average prices are still off from high of $118990 Units of three bedrooms or more continue to show the healthiest price increases rising 47 percent in the first six months of the year Two-bedroom apartments were up 37 percent The weakest segment of this market has been studio and one-bedroom apartments but evidence that this segment may be firming up Hie William Mqy Co says its two Manhattan offices showed a 45 percent increase in the number of second-quarter condo and co-op sales compared with the first quarter May reported that sales of studios were up 17 percent in the period and sales of one-bedroom units were up 100 percent Peter Marra president of May said the trend could signal the beginning of a recovery for smaller but previously hud to sell units report found one-bedroom prices in Manhattan dipping 13 percent in the first six months of 1994 an improvement over the 56 percent dip during the first six months of 1993 In some areas of the borough however one-bedroom prices increased this year Along Park Avenue prices were up 66 percent and along Central Park West prices were up 46 percent In two Brooklyn offices which cover Brooklyn Heights Park Slope Clinton Hill and surrounding areas the number of studio transactions dipped 9 percent while one-bedroom sales rose 18 percent during the second quarter This could be an indication MaTra said that first-time buyers in Brooklyn are opting to enter the market with one-bedroom units rather than studios Corcoran also reported that buyers were able to negotiate 15 percent off original asking prices during the first half of 1994 During the same period in 1993 purchasers were able to negotiate 166 percent off CITYSPIRE SELL-OUT More positive market news: A midtown Manhattan condominium tower begun in the 1980s and plagued by problems including foreclosure has finally sold out Completed in 1989 CitySpire went into foreclosure two years later after its developer Ian Bruce Eichner was forced into bankruptcy When the lender European American Bank took over 75 of the 340 units remained unsold in the 7 3-story building at 150 56th St EAB spent $4 million completing the unsold units and solving other problems including a mysterious whistling noise that came from the building and disturbed area residents It turned out to be the wind howling through the domed cap sues office shut down in 1991 reopened in 1993 with the remaining 75 units priced from $296000 At the beginning of the month the last condo was sold for an average price of $400 per square foot RIGHT OF REJECTION waited months to find a buyer for your co-op unit only to learn the board of directors has rejected the purchaser While you may want to fight the decision experts say little you can do really an irrevocable said Edward Braverman senior partner of Braverman Associates a Manhattan law firm counsel to over 80 co-ops Disgruntled unit owners have taken objections all the way to the highest court which has ruled that a co-op is like a dub he said In buying a unit a person is gaining membership The board can reject the person for any reason or for no reason when deciding with whom it wants to share its elevators and management problems The only exception is rejecting someone on discriminatory grounds such as race creed or color which is against federal law Even when boards have rejected buyers because the selling price was too low the courts have upheld the decision Braverman said Boards have a duty to maintain the value Joe Catalano it a free-lance writer Lawyer Anthony Gentile is representing a 59-year-old man who fell and shattered his wrist hole and had to go to the hospital The jury awarded him $50000 and the judge upped it to $100000" Arroyo thought the award was too low but on appeal the jury actually lowered it to $75000 Because of the sundry loopholes for property owners under the current law the bulk of the awards in these cases ends up being drawn from city coffers An example is the ordeal of John Haney a 59-year-old Brooklyn worker who fell on private property but landed in what might be considered a gray area was a salt-of-the-earth kind of guy walking bad from lunch when he steps into a hide in the sidewalk fells and breaks his fell with his said Anthony Gentile another partner with Schneider Meinick tremendous pain he drives home and later goes to the hospital Turns out he had a shattered wrist the bones had spread and now three years later he can't move his wrist without having pain" It also turns out that Hanley had fallen in a specially cut driveway which would theoretically be the property responsibility So with Gentile's help he sued both the city and the owner But the owner claimed that the damage to his driveway was caused by fire trucks pulling out of the city-owned engine house across the street In the end the jury found that the city had to pay 65 percent of the $796000 verdict The owner paid 25 percent and Haney was found 10 peroent responsible for his own misstep thought that the property owner would take it on the chin with this one Then he came up with this firehouse said Gentile The greatest irony Gentile added is that neither the city nor theproperty owner has bothered to fix the sidewalk The battle cry from outside the government is that the city should be doing more to repair itself whole city is put together with spit and a prayer" said Beskin When the city does react to a defect it generally approaches the building owner and gives him the choice of having it repaired himself or allowing the city to make the repair at the expense The catch is that if the owner uses his own contractor he assumes liability went around and saw that the sidewalk sections the city said were defective did not look defeo-tive so I decided to let the city do it their way" said Michael Cantor president of Cantor Real Estate in Brooklyn the price was But Cantor says still waiting for the city to do the work on the two buddings in Queens and the taro in Brooklyn The 'I keep telling the Apple out of trouble is that anything about the cases keep New York and ice from sidewalks and curbs adjacent to their property" Hie current sidewalk laws and loopholes also exdude one- two- and three-family homes where the dty is completely responsible for sidewalks and curbs Under the proposed amendment said Kahn people who fall on sidewalks would not be by the amendment of the right to sue the dty This just extends the right to sue the landlord The dty can even turn around and sue the property owner for any verdict amount handed down against it This year the proposal became part of tort reform package which is looking to reduce the budget by an estimated $45 million Yet in its five-year history the proposal has been routinely shot down in the state Legislature because insurance in city to put Big business The only they do the defects so piling Stephan Peskin president State Trial Lawyers Association tive director of the Community Housing Improvement Program an advocacy group million people can cross a patch of sidewalk without falling But when one person does fall the courts and insurance companies have no way of distinguishing an accident from clumsiness so awards have bear Peskin was even less charitable even though his clients stand to haul in the same caliber of awards if not more considering that juries will know the money is no longer coming from taxpayers bottom line is that trying to balance the budget on the backs of people who are he said obligation as a municipality is to maintain sidewalks and not a responsibility I feel they should Insurance brokers note that companies already cast a critical eye at a trip-and-fall track record amendment or no amendment the building becomes an unruly claims hazard under the proposed law insurance companies might require even more inspections of sidewalks or they may refuse to write some noted Mike Zeldes a vice president with Kaye Insurance Associates a brokerage Yet mapy building owners and managers especially those at co-ops and condos where the appearance is often considered more important seem to be going ahead with sidewalk work anyway despite the catch in the law recently went before a board of directors in Sheepahead bay and told them we needed to replace a 146-by-10-foot section of sidewalk at a cost of $8300" said Michael Cantor might seem counterproductive in terms of the law as it is but I just call it preventive rJ city not following through he said a big that he and other owners have faced Rather than step up its repair programs however the dty has been trying for the past five years to push for lgiltinn to amend the Administrative Code to liability on the owners of commercial real property and residential real property other than me- two- and three-femily dwellings for their failure to maintain and repair sidewalks and curbs adja- dustry and property owners lobby very hard against it because it would mean increased costs and increased premiums" said state Attorney General Oliver Koppell who as a legislator proposed the bill originally- The anti-reform forces are not backing down this time either think that tort reform is necessary but the tort reform we need is not the kind that shifts the responsibility to owners but limits the wit to their property ud for failure to remove snow awards that are said Dan Margulies execu-.