While real estate brokers live by the old adage, Location, Location, Location, accountants define their relationships with the real estate community with another phrase: Communication, Communi-cation, Communication. While cooperatives and c…
Times change and your building's house rules should change along with them. A decade may have passed since your house rules were first written or last updated. In that time, the City has passed stringent new anti-smoking and recycling law…
All too often boards of co-ops and condos find themselves at the mercy of the conversion sponsor. Wielding his influence over the building and all its affairs, the sponsor's goals are frequently in contrast with those of the board and build…
Imagine that your building's sponsor has planted a friend or business partner in one of the units he owns in the building. This shareholder then decides to run for a seat on the board and with the help of the sponsor, wins. In addition t…
Tom Marcossan laughs when he remembers joining the board as treasurer when his building went co-op in 1986. "I was stupid. I didn't read the magazines available or take advantage of any organizations out there. We were the first board the b…
To be, or not to be [taxed]? That is the question. It appears that William Shakespeare had been posing the same question that treasurers and other board members of New York co-ops have been asking their accountants for the past five…
A cooperative is generally organized as a so-called business corporation, just like, for example, IBM or AT&T. Accordingly, shareholders of a cooperative have the same rights as shareholders in other New York business corporations to init…
The collapse of the New York real estate market in the late 1980s left dozens, if not hundreds, of co-ops unable to pay or refinance their mortgages. Many sponsors managed to have their plans declared effective with only 15 percent of the u…
The City Council has made protection of homeownersincluding co-op and condo ownersone of its highest priorities. We do this because we understand that home ownership fosters a sense of pride in home, community and city. Property owners …
Neil Goldstein flashes a look of genuine surprise when a resident kisses him hello on the cheek in the lobby of The Harmony, an Upper East Side co-op where he is board president. Other residents trot by with friendly waves and call out, How…