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Problem Solved! For Co-ops and Condos
From building repairs and maintenance, energy upgrades, insurance, lobby redesigns, accounting and financing - the challenges facing co-op and condominium board directors are endless. In this series, Habitat Magazine editors interview New York City experts to learn how problems have been solved at their client co-op and condo buildings. We take a deep dive into the issues being confronted, the possibilities for solutions, the costs, the challenges, and the outcomes. Habitat Magazine, founded in 1982, is the trusted resource for New York City co-ops and condo board directors. Visit us at www.habitatmag.com
Episodes
90 episodes
The Simple Tech Solution to Missing Equipment
Luggage carts have a way of disappearing in doorman buildings, tucked into hallways and forgotten until someone else needs one and can't find it anywhere. It's the kind of small, everyday annoyance most residents just shrug off. On this episode...
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What It Really Costs to Get a Lobby Right
A West Village condo opened with a lobby designed by a high-profile architect, the kind of detail that helped sell apartments before anyone moved in. But once residents settled in, the design started working against them: materials that couldn'...
How a $38,000 Upgrade Paid for Itself in a Year
Insurance costs have become one of the biggest headaches for New York co-op and condo boards, and umbrella policies are feeling the squeeze hardest. Sophie Bird, senior vice president at IMA Corp., explains wh...
How One Missed Detail Nearly Derailed a Filing Deadline
Garage inspections sound like unremarkable, until a single overlooked detail turns a routine repair into a race against a filing deadline. In this episode, Charles Phillips, senior project manager at Me...
Six Buildings, One Facade Crisis, and a Plan That Worked
A five-year, nearly $10 million facade restoration across six Manhattan high-rises sounds like a board's worst nightmare, but careful planning turned it into a success story. Michael Stripunsky, associate principal at
What Happens When a Co-op Can't Reach Quorum
A 450-unit co-op in the Bronx spent years unable to get enough shareholders engaged to hold a valid board election. Linda Gibbs, owner and president of Honest Ballot, has spent nearly three decades helpin...
When a Management Transition Goes Quietly Wrong
A management company transition should be routine: the old firm hands everything off, the new one takes over, and life goes on. But Carl Cesarano, principal at Cesarano & Khan, has spent years watching ...
The Repairs That Made a Facade Worse
A landmark Upper West Side co-op thought its terracotta facade just needed another round of repairs. Instead, it uncovered nine cycles of patchwork that had made things worse. Raul Mayta, principal architect and co-founder of
The Six Inches That Could Cost Your Building Thousands
Replacing a roof sounds straightforward — until it isn't. For co-op and condo boards, a routine repair can spiral into a cascade of unexpected consequences, all triggered by something as small as a change in thickness. In this episode, Craig To...
The Financial Landmines Inside Every Management Transition
Switching managing agents sounds straightforward — until it isn't. In this episode Meredith Wettach, manager at WilkinGuttenplan, unpacks the financial surprises that quietly derail co-op and condo building...
The ADA Complaint That Went Federal
Accessibility complaints are one of those slow-moving threats that co-op and condo boards rarely see coming — until they're already in trouble. In this episode, Louis Lipson and Eric Cohen, principals and architects at
Your Roof Is Hiding a Massive (But Fixable) Energy Problem
If your building's energy bills feel like they're running on autopilot, it's time for a wake-up call. John Stevens, founder of Alternative Sustainability, reveals how rooftop exhaust fans cou...
When Century-Old Gas Pipes Finally Fail
A 1912 building on the Upper East Side failed its gas inspection and faced a terrifying reality: repairs could exceed half a million dollars, with residents losing cooking gas for an indefinite period. Peter Varsalona, principal at
Why Your Governing Documents Are Sabotaging Your Insurance Rates
A newer Upper West Side condominium was facing a crisis: three water damage claims over four years had pushed their insurance premium from $50,000 to $130,000. Sophie Bird, Senior Vice President at IMA Financial G...
Laser Scans and Leaning Towers: How Technology Is Revealing Facade Faults
What happens when a multi-million-dollar condo conversion hides serious structural problems in plain sight? Restoration architect Hannah Sebastian, co-founder of Mayta + Sebastian Architecture, walk...
The Hidden Price of Delaying Your FISP Inspection
An 18-story Upper West Side condo thought they were being financially prudent by delaying their facade inspection. Instead, they ended up paying half a million dollars more than they should have. Gene Ferrara, president at
Cutting Cornice Costs Without Sacrificing Historic Character
When a 1927 Emery Roth building on the Upper West Side faced a crumbling cornice, the board could have spent a fortune on traditional terracotta and waited two years for installation. Instead, Oswald Bertolini and Eric Vonderhyde, partners at <...
How to Prepare for the Number 4 Oil Phase-Out
New York City’s phase-out of No. 4 heating oil is accelerating, and Jeff Cohn, Director of Energy Programs at Approved Oil, lays out the practical steps every No. 4 oil-fueled building must take to stay co...
What Happens When Nobody's Watching Your Election
A 200-plus-unit Manhattan condo thought they were holding a routine virtual election. Votes were cast through Zoom chat and emergency intervention was required to certify the results. In this episode, Corinne Arnold and Will Kwan from
How Smart Building Controls Pay for Themselves
Warren House, a 330-unit post-war condo in Murray Hill, was staring down rising utility bills and Local Law 97 fines. What happened next offers a blueprint for other buildings facing similar pressures. Robert Post, vice president of co-op and c...
The Condo that Stopped Replacing “A with A”
Residents of 1 Grand Army Plaza — a sleek, all-glass condo in Brooklyn — struggled with sweltering corridors and soaring repair bills, and set out to find why. Unfortunately, the “why” turned out to be a fundamental design flaw in the building’...
Why Your Insurance Premium Just Tripled — and What To Do
Insurance carriers are abandoning New York buildings at an alarming rate, and your co-op or condo could be next. Jason Schiciano, co-president of Levitt-Fuirst Insurance and Bonding, reveals how a 108...
The Co-op That Lost Its Tax Break — and How It Got It Back
When a small Manhattan co-op suddenly saw its budget spike, rising costs weren’t the culprit — it was an administrative filing error. Turns out the co-op had lost its co-op tax abatement worth $60,000 because its management company had missed t...