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For a Deal, How About a Park Avenue Fixer-Upper?

Some prewar co-ops are selling at discounts of as much as 25 percent.

The price of this seven-room co-op on Park Avenue has gone from $3.695 million to $3.495 million. The kitchen and bathrooms could use updating.Credit...Brown Harris Stevens

Buyers who are looking for a great deal in the New York real estate market — and who isn’t looking for a great deal in the New York real estate market? — can currently find (relative) bargains galore in the most unlikely places: the high-ceilinged, high-toned, high-end prewar co-ops that line Park Avenue, Fifth Avenue and pieces of East End Avenue.

“The luxury market has taken one of the largest hits recently, and prices are down,” said Kathy Braddock, a managing director at William Raveis NYC. “It’s a good time if you’re interested in that kind of purchase.”

Lisa Larson, an associate broker at Warburg Realty specializing in luxury properties on the Upper East Side, estimated that there are discounts of 25 percent or more to be had for co-ops on Park Avenue and Fifth Avenue in need of renovation.

Ms. Larson offered such examples as an eight-room co-op with Central Park views that sold on a high floor at 1136 Fifth Avenue for $4.775 million and, she said, would have likely fetched nearly $1 million more three or four years ago. “The apartment needs a gut renovation, which could be done for $1 million or $1.125,” she said, and “once the work is done it would probably trade for close to $7 million.”

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This eight-room co-op on Park Avenue was listed in 2016 for $16.5 million. It is now on the market for $8.995 million.Credit...Warburg Realty

An eight-room co-op in need of a gut renovation at 778 Park Avenue, a Rosario Candela-designed building, came on the market for $16.5 million in January 2016. It went into contract in 2017 for $9.995 million, but the deal was scotched and the apartment went off the market for a spell. It became available again a few weeks ago for an even lower price: $8.995 million.

It joins a $3.495 million seven-room apartment in need of work at 1133 Park Avenue. Four years ago, an apartment in the same line a few floors up, also requiring attention, went for $4.355 million.

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The co-op has been emptied, so the listing includes photos that have been virtually staged with furniture.Credit...Warburg Realty

“We started at $3.695 million last winter, and we thought we would sell in the first week. And a few years ago we would have had a bidding war,” said Joanne Greene, an associate broker with Brown Harris Stevens and the listing agent for the property. “We lowered the price in October, and now it’s the best deal on Park Avenue.”

On the 11th floor of 120 East End Avenue, a 14-room estate-condition apartment listed for $6.25 million recently went into contract, after a price drop of more than $2 million. Four years ago, a seventh-floor apartment with a similar floor plan that was in need of some updating sold for $10.25 million.

Of course, buyers in such buildings have to have iron constitutions and the patience routinely associated with saints. Some high-end co-ops restrict home improvement — in any case, demolition — to the summer months, thus potentially stretching out a full-on renovation for years. Still, “if you have some vision and you have the stamina for a gut renovation, you are getting a deal,” Ms. Larson said.

But as with many deals, this one has a catch: You have to get past a barrier known as the co-op board.

“There are people who, in the past, would have thought Fifth or Park Avenue was too rich for their blood, but who have seen prices come down,” Ms. Larson said. “They’re getting more bold about making offers in co-ops where they wouldn’t have even looked during a seller’s market.”

Some luxury buildings on the Upper East Side are notorious for their strict financial requirements and will accept only all-cash deals or require a minimum of 50 percent down; others require buyers to have liquid assets worth five or six times the sale price of the apartment. But these days, Ms. Larson said, “there are buyers who are thinking, ‘Maybe they’ll take me; maybe the board will loosen their standards and accept a less financially qualified candidate.’”

These buyers, however, are not always rewarded for their boldness.

“If anything, boards have become more strict,” she said. “I don’t think they like to see apartment values dropping in their buildings.”

While some boards may have accepted that the market glow has dimmed, they are still protective about closing prices, Ms. Braddock said.

But there are ways to make all sides happy. Consider a decrepit apartment that goes for $3 million.

“That’s the price that will be on the books,” said Steven R. Wagner, a real estate lawyer. “But at closing, by prearrangement, the new owners will receive a credit for repairs or renovations they have to make, lessening the size of the check they have to write.”

He cautioned that a lending institution (if there is one involved in the transaction) would need to be kept in the loop, and he also sounded a warning about the tax consequences.

As for the co-op board, “its members may well know about the arrangement,” Mr. Wagner said. “But they may be happy to look the other way because a higher price is being registered — and there may also be a higher flip tax.”

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A version of this article appears in print on  , Section RE, Page 8 of the New York edition with the headline: For a Deal, How About a Park Avenue Fixer-Upper?. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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