Rehab Job In NYC Help Please
Hopefully there are some seasoned rehabbers that have had some experience in NYC that might be able to help me with some advice. I am currently looking into purchasing a 2 family w/15 class B apts. I would like to convert it to a 3 or 4 family. The inside of the house needs to be totally gutted and re-built, the area is ok and is in the process of turning around. My question is can anyone give me an average price per square foot for a total gut job and rehab in NYC? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Cannot be done with any precision and he that does is going to pad it out to absorb that terrible time when some tear down exposes a really complicated situation. Before you start do proper planning so that your contractor and/or support crew know what it is you are reallying trying to accomplish. Also if I were you check zoning and code requirements cause it looks like you are doing some interesting up grades.
NYC is pretty much the same as anywhere except inspectors are a little more professional and are willing to advice if brought in early.
Interesting project soon you will be another William (Big Bill) Zekendorff.
Cheers Lucius
I've rehabbed in Brooklyn... Park Slope... Any tenants in there? I hope not. Also, be careful who you use if you bring in someone from out of county, like LI or Jersey, make sure they're licensed to work in brooklyn.
I didn't exactly gut my brownstones, but I did some major renovation. I guess a good rule of thumb is to project about 1.5X your estimate, and don't get screwed by a really cheap contractor, he'll take 20 years to finish anyhting, if they finish anything at all.
Quick story, a friend recently renovated a brownstone in Park Slope, I think it was on President by 7th ave., anyway, he hired a cheap contractor, and the contractor ended up not finishing the work, and told my friend to go "f" himself, and sue him. Turns out, suing him, would prob. cost about as much as hiring another contractor to finish the work, which he ended up doing. Thus, it cost him 1.5X the estimate. Gotta love NY!