Thursday, August 4, 2016

Report: Village View residents considering going private



The residents/shareholders of Village View, the 1,200-plus-unit Mitchell-Lama co-op, "are now mulling whether to withdraw from the affordable housing program," according to an article in this week's issue of The Villager.

Per the article:

The decision to withdraw would allow residents to sell their units for a huge profit. But some worry it would be shortsighted to cash in on their below-market-rate homes — and that privatizing could further erode the neighborhood’s affordability.

And!

Withdrawing from the program would require a two-thirds vote by residents of at least 822 apartments. If the measure passes, shareholders could choose to deregulate their units and put them on the market. They could also relinquish their shares by leaving and having their equity returned, or stay on as tenants in rent-regulated apartments.

It sounds as if all this is still in the exploration-only stage. Village View's board of directors reportedly started holding informational meetings in June to discuss the possibility of converting to a private co-op.

According to The Villager: "The first step in the process would be to vote in favor of a feasibility study that would examine the consequences of leaving the program. At least 51 percent of shareholders from a minimum of 617 apartments would have to vote to support the study."

Village View, which opened in 1964, consists of seven buildings between First Avenue and Avenue A, from East Second Street to East Sixth Street.

84 comments:

Anonymous said...

Please don't screw over the middle class and future generations by getting greedy. Going private would all but destroy any hope of anyone making less than six figures to afford to live anywhere.

Anonymous said...

The whole affordable housing program is B.S. There are many people that own apartments here & elsewhere that have a lot of money. There is plenty of affordable housing apartments in the city but many times they don't always go to the people that deserve and need them.

Anonymous said...

The thought of this irritates me to no end. More old-time resident cashing out? For what? More greedy spoiled Millenials moving in while their Moms and Pops pay for their Greedy spoiled selfish asses to destroy our neighborhood?

cmarrtyy said...

Greed knows no bound. We as a society monetize everything and anything. It's a natural progression. Most of the people who live in Village will vote one way or another for the money. Just reality. Greed wins! Greed wins again!

Anonymous said...

Terrible.
This is only good for the people that will take the money
and go elsewhere.
What about the rest - the ones that are there because of their
income - and - where are all the social security people going to go … ?
Who came up with this idea, and who is it supposed to really benefit ?

Brian said...

It benefits the people that currently live there. They are the owners of Village View.

Brian said...

If it goes as well as Coop Village did, then the income and social security people will do fine and have the option to cash out or move to a better option when the time comes because of the ability to cash out. Also, one can keep apt and rent it out partially or fully like at Coop Village to generate income where they are not allowed under mitchell lama.

Anonymous said...

Ultimately it was taxpayers that enabled Mitchell-Lama and other affordable housing. Mitchell-Lama was a civic/public "good."

If taxpayers enabled Mitchell-Lama, how is it that the current residents get to decide to go market? Where is the government?

Shameful that residents who have benefitted would destroy affordable housing for the future.

Anonymous said...

So, I don't understand this.... They get to live in cheap housing for 40 years and then get a million to sell the place?

Anonymous said...

I Don't know why it's called afforable housing when these hdfc coops/affordable housing programs let rich parents buy/gift an apartment for their kids. give it to people who actually deserve it they are completely destroying the main reason affordable housing was started

Anonymous said...

Of course they are going to. They are technically within their rights but this is just bullshit. At a minimum they should be required to pay back the value of their tax subsidy. Not to mention that the way in which they have operated their waiting list is super-shady.

Anonymous said...

A lot of shady things happen through out these buildings that are in a affording housing program whether it's Mitchell-Lama co-op or hdfc co-op such as illegal sub-letting, not using the apartment as your primary residence, shady managers stealing money, (hdfc) buying these units cheap to then resell for profit years later etc. list goes on and HPD and the city need to be on top of these things when share holders complain if any of these things listed occur.

Scuba Diva said...

Everyone, please remember that humanity will be extinct within 100 years, no matter what we do. There's no time like the present, and we might as well live it up.

Anonymous said...

Funny how most of the commenters are upset. You're only upset because YOU don't have one of these apartments. These folks can do as they please. This is perfectly legal and these folks aren't responsible for NYC having 'affordable' housing. If they want to sell and move to Florida they can or they can stay. They are the owners of the complex. This is a common practice all over the Tri State area as well. People who bought homes in the 70s cashing in and moving to warmer cheaper locations. What is wrong with that? NYC wasn't a desirable location in the 1970s. They were practically giving these places away. I know people who bought apts near central park for less than 5k because nobody wanted them. Now they're worth millions. If you need 'affordable' housing move out of NYC. The average house in America (its west of the Hudson- you might have heard of it) sells for around $200k. Rents are cheap and you don't have to provide 500 pages of documents and pay $5000 to get the keys. If you cant afford it leave. Its that simple.

Anonymous said...

Some more of the old "I got mine Jack." Forty years of tax payer subsidies to create good housing for working people and it worked but now lets cash out as if it was a private investment. No sorry it was not this was a public program and they benefited and continue to benefit from it living there. So being able to privatize and cash out at market rates is obscene decades ago a lottery system gave you good fortune in getting one of these units don't push your luck you already drank from the public trough.

Brian said...

At least some of the wealth is being spread to real lower middle class people when these Mitchell Lama limited equity coops opt to go private. When a rent stabilized building turns coop, the stabilized tenants are usually all kicked out first, or at least 99% of them are. Here, nobody is being kicked out. Everyone that stays alive will be getting a piece of the pie.

K/d0 said...

really good point from 3:07. doesnt seem right to receive a subside for half a century, and as 2:12 mentions, then cash out for a million.

as far as rich parents gifting it to their kids, certainly that's not the intent of affordable housing but hard to say it should just be taken away from them because of their success.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, Donnie. That isn't relevant at all. Nobody at the Village View is in danger of getting kicked out. They would be electing to leave, would get a huge windfall, and the stock of affordable housing would be reduced after receiving years of tax subsidies. If they don't exit the program and want to sell, they can do so and someone else can buy. There's a waiting list so nobody in those buildings are in any sort of bind.

Anonymous said...

It is subsidized housing not cheap 1970 real estate that is now worth several times more. If you get a city controled below market price because of your income you shouldn't be able to turn around and sell at market price.

Anonymous said...

anon 3:36 These folks can do as they please. This is perfectly legal and these folks aren't responsible for NYC having 'affordable' housing. WE ALL PAID FOR THE APARTMENTS.
People who bought homes in the 70s cashing in and moving to warmer cheaper locations. What is wrong with that? NOTHING BUT THEY DID NOT BUY THEIR HOMES, IN REALITY THE TAX PAYERS BOUGHT THEIR HOMES.
They were practically giving these places away. WHO I THEY? THE GOVERNMENT?
If you need 'affordable' housing move out of NYC. ANOTHER WISE PERSON, IF YOU DON'T LIKE (FILL IN THE BLANK: NOISE, RENT, GARBAGE, HIGH RENT... )
If you cant afford it leave. Its that simple. I DON'T KNOW HOW OLD YOU ARE OR IF YOU EVEN LIVE IN THE EAST VILLAGE, BUT IF I HAD CONTROL I WOULD MAKE SURE THAT YOU WERE FORCED OUT OF HERE.

THE POINT IS that this was a subsidized program paid for by EVERYONE'S taxes. thw apartments were not paid for by the residents at whatever the current market rate was at the time. and the seller was the government not looking for a profit but to create affordagle housing. that is certainly not the same as someone buying an apartment or house building with their own money.

Anonymous said...

If these programs were meant for low to middle income people why would it be accessible to the rich? -___-

Anonymous said...

I agree with you 100 percent

Anonymous said...

I know 2 people who live in apartments over there who also have rent stabilized apartments.
Double dipping.

Anonymous said...

Anon 4:06 -- Amen!! Everyone on here just likes to bitch and moan. Looking for affordable housing - take a chance on Detroit - tough it out like real estate buyers in the '70s did in NYC and then maybe in 30 years you'll be able to sell for millions too. The American dream is dead because everyone expects a hand out. There was a place like like that called the Soviet Union - google it to see how it turned out.

Anonymous said...

Fair points.

Brian said...

My point was that no one is getting kicked out!!! I was responding to someone who said people were getting kicked out if they convert out of Mitchell Lama.

Brian said...

Here is something some of you people do not understand. The tenants on Village View are the legal owners of Village View. They are coop owners, not just tenant or renters. The city or state does not own the property by law. It is just a legal arrangement through legislation called Mitchell -Lama bill that in exchange for reduced taxes the property is limited equity coop. BULut the coop is allowed to opt out of the arrangement by their choice, not the city/state's choice.

Anonymous said...

Village East Towers on Avenue C faced the same decision some years ago and chose to stay in the Mitchell-Lama program. I really respected them chosing to live their (lefty) values instead of cashing out.

Anonymous said...

Donnie and others, they may be legal owners but that's only because they were able to purchase for ~$30-40k. If they were to sell today they cannot profit at all, thereby preserving affordable housing stock. The low purchase price was made possible by the use of public resources and ongoing tax subsidies because there is a public benefit to having affordable housing. It's not easy to make that possible so it's offensive when people profit off of public goods in a way that goes completely against the intent of the public investment. Arguing in favor of their right to sell is akin to not recognizing how taxes pay for roads, education, defense, etc.

Anonymous said...

Anon 9:01PM: According to the rules of Mitchell Lama you are allowed to own apartments, houses, condos, etc elsewhere as long as the ML is your main residence.

Anonymous said...

If you need 'affordable' housing move out of NYC. The average house in America (its west of the Hudson- you might have heard of it) sells for around $200k. Rents are cheap and you don't have to provide 500 pages of documents and pay $5000 to get the keys. If you cant afford it leave. Its that simple.

YOU are simple. You realize that there are entire industries based in NYC that barely exist in your golden land of sub-200K houses, yeah? So tell me what I'm supposed to do for a living out in BFE when I've invested 20 years in one field and there are no serious employment opportunities out there in "America," since we're also apparently using unnecessary "scare quotes" now. I don't know how much time you've spent where land is cheap, but it's not like it's overrun with great and plentiful jobs, and we're not all "blessed" to have tech-based positions that can be done from our moms' basements.

Anonymous said...

So is everyone arguing on behalf of the right to sell also O.K. with what happened at Rivington House? The conclusion there is that no laws were broken.

Brian said...

Anon 7:06, the intent of the public investment in the ML property is clearly defined in the ML law. The intent is to make it affordable housing for a period of years with certain tax relief in exchange for limited equity status and oversite by state housing dept and the power granted to the owners of the limited equity of an option to convert to complete unlimited equity in exchange of lifting the property tax relief. The intent is explicitly stated in the legislated law from inception. No ifs ands or buts. The option is granted to whoever the current deed holders, so stop this b.s. that it was not the intent.

Anonymous said...

Two years ago, the "city" tried to kick older Village View residents who are widowed or have children who left, into studio apartments. Going private is as much about keeping our homes as it is anything else!

Anonymous said...

I grew up in Village View and moved out in the late 70s and my mother stayed. I've been on the waiting list for 7 years but if VV deregulates I'm out of luck because there's no way I can afford market value whenever my waiting list number comes up. And I'm not eligible to inherit my mother's apartment and I'm sure she won't be able to purchase if it goes private. So my hope is, leave one of the last middle class options we have on the Lower East Side. If it falls, I think Masaryk is the last one open.

Cosmo said...

4:06 is either trolling or pathetically ignorant.

7:06 - well-said.

Anonymous said...

Donnie, this amounts to a lottery windfall for a few at the expense of everyone else. Like with Rivington House, just because it's technically legal doesn't make it ethical. The legislative intent does not account for the questionable way in which the wait list was managed, either.

cmarrtyy said...

The absurdity of this is overwhelming. The apartments are subsidized by the city/state/feds and now we allow the tenants to vote on a sale which could line their pockets with millions. And BEB our soon to be former mayor, has been trying to create more middle class apartments. Where does this fit in?! Why are we giving this building to a group of tenants who happen to be lucky enough to be living there? It belongs to the city. The city should sell the building and build more affordable housing with the revenue.

Anonymous said...

11:50AM - I would not use the word "ethical" or "unethical" in regards to this matte. There is a group that has formed at the Village View to do what they can to stop this from moving forward. Maybe someone from there can weigh in on this matter and what's going on.

Anonymous said...

i would hope that the proportion of the original purchase purchase price that was subsidized initially flows back to the community (so as that same % of current selling price).

Sponsoring someone's house because they couldn't afford a market rate and then having people sell at market price and reap 100% of the value increase sounds ludicrous...

Anonymous said...

I guess some of you can't read or have serious comprehension issues. The city DOES NOT own this building. The TENANTS own the building and legally can do as they please. They invested in an neighborhood nobody wanted to live in and stayed there for decades. The point was to bring in middle class people and upgrade a neighborhood- now it would be called 'gentrification'. The investment worked as the area has completely changed. I don't know why this is so hard to understand.

Anonymous said...

Anon 9:29am. I guess my comment really hit home. If you've spent 20 years in one field and can't find employment outside of NYC you are guilty of poor planning and being shortsighted. That is your fault. I've spent plenty of time where land is cheap scouting for a house. There are jobs that - while they pay less than NYC positions- pay for the rent/mortgage with no issues. Not sure why you chose to try to insult me at the end. Most rational people wouldn't stay in a city they can't afford. If you can't afford the rents and taxes and are barely scraping by- why stay? The clean timely subways? The wonderful weather? It doesn't make any sense.

Anonymous said...

Anon 2:52, do you have reading comprehension issues? The tenants were not the only investors. Did you read the part about how this was subsidized by everyone else? What did they actually invest? Give anyone the option to "invest" at such a low price and with such little risk and you won't find a shortage of takers. There's a waiting list after all (which has been run in a fishy manner). You can call it an investment but if you divvy up the bill you'll find that everyone else put in way more than the tenants did.

Anonymous said...

3:01 PM - Family obligation, children who live with an ex-partner most of the time, etc. What you're proposing is that in order to live in NYC you must fit a certain checklist of skills, demographics, etc. Sounds awful and myopic.

Anonymous said...

I guess my comment really hit home. If you've spent 20 years in one field and can't find employment outside of NYC you are guilty of poor planning and being shortsighted.

No, dinkus, It is NOT poor planning to live in the city where the best talent resides and the most opportunity exists in your field. And it is NOT poor planning to dedicate your life to one profession! That very suggestion is fucking absurd.

There are certain forms of art and media (just to give two examples) that do not have major industry representation outside of New York City, and especially not in the cornpone towns you're suggest we move to. Your comment didn't "hit home"; your comment -- "Just move! Herp derp!" -- is simply glib and stupid.

Oh and the other reason why I stay? the fact that I was BORN HERE

Brian said...

It does not belong to the city. Go to the recorder of deeds and you will find each apartment deeded to the tenant who occupies it. Go to ACRIS and look up the property addresses for yourself. The building belongs to the coop shareholders, not the city.

Anonymous said...

I live at Village View. I want to continue to live here, in the East Village. There are 7 buildings, over a thousand apartments. Each building is like a "block" of residents. IF Village View goes private it is the end of the East Village. Gentrification has been going on for a while, this will fast track the process and cause secondary displacement like we have not seen before. The community will be upscaled for those moving in. If you can afford the rent, where are you going to shop? This will affect all of you, not just the ones living at Village View.

Anonymous said...

I've recently moved into Village View after 7 years on the famous waitlist (had a good number) and I'm rabidly against privatization. I trust that many neighbors will see the value in maintaining it as a close, non-transient community, and if need be, I will get involved however I can against privatization. I trust that many people understand we've been lucky to get apartments there and it's a moral obligation to maintain this possibility for others, however slow the process may be.

Anonymous said...

Thanks to the two residents at 8:08 and 9:18, who seem like good stewards of these public enabled goods. Donnie, where did you get those glasses? I'd like to buy a pair. Your most recent point was not in dispute. I could use a pair of selective reading glasses.

Brian said...

Here is the thing, the current public would probably be for privatization as well because they would want Village View to pay their own property tax load. Currently they don't.

Anonymous said...

Let this happen. The more wealthy people who move here, the less culture there is, the less appealing it is to live here, the less people move here, or the only people who move here are those who bring zero culture to the city, so who cares i.e. who wants to live among them anyway?, the lower the rents, these people move away, the interesting people move back in. Or it's just an endless parade of the rich and their plantation workers. Let Manhattan, NYC become a plantation. Ditto for Boston, Philadelpha, Baltimore, and Washington DC (last three wannabe never will be Bostons.) There's a whole wide world out there to have a life in.

Btw assuming 1M per apartment, that's 600K after taxes, right? What will that buy you in Manhattan assuming you wanted to remain in Manhattan? Maybe a one-bedroom. 'Say the bare minimum price for a 1BR in Manhattan is 500K - where in Manhattan? Crime-ridden above 96th Street or nice but too far from everything Inwood where else? You'd have only 100K left for maintenance fees etc. You better buy real estate in one of the outerboroughs or outside the city and enjoy that. Enjoy going from Manhattan to who knows where? You better deal with the culture shock and get used to your new place cuz that's it unless you sell. And say you buy a house in Queens - hello property taxes, home upkeep etc. You gonna do that at 65? 73? 84?

These buyouts are really getouts as in "get out of Manhattan or NYC".

Let these people take their 600K after taxes each and invest it elsewhere in this country. Let the rich choke on NYC.

Anonymous said...

Southbridge Tower in lower Manhattan voted to privatize in 2014 and it went private off Mitchell Lama status in 9/2015. Over 1600 units were in the project, built in 1971. Coop Village on the Lower East Side, a huge group of ML coops voted to go private in the late 1990s. There are 4500 apartments there built in the 50s I think. Why no huge public outcry for the conversions? Why such virulent outcry on this comment board now? Could it be with the current housing market, some people just freak out over any whiff of the appearance of any sort of perceived "loss" of affordable housing in the already over regulated NYC market? But you are barking up the,wrong tree. Fact is that ML was set up to give an incentive to build in undesirable places and attract middle class or lower middle class folk to live there, but then incentivize them to privatize once things got better and relieve the state and city of the tax burden they gave up in the bargain. The option to privatize was given to the shareholder in the coops that were formed once a certain time period elapsed, usually a few decades as outlined in legislation that formed each ML coop.


Anonymous said...

There were 4 informational sessions to explain the process. At the end of the session a board member stated that we are not responsible to keep the affordable housing plan going. He stated that the program was for 20 years only. After that time people should move out to the suburbs. Shame on you Mr. Board Member. Why are you still here. Why have you not moved to the suburbs. Shame on all the other board members who voted to start this process, many of which have lived off the system for quite some time. Shame on you for causing undue stress on those who want to continue living here. What about those who have just moved into the complex, shouldn't they have their 20 years. This is a plan of greed, with no caring for those who can't afford to move, and call Village View their home.

Anonymous said...

What about those of us who live in the community and are on the waiting list. What happens to us? As we get older aren't we entitled to an elevator, a laundry room. We the waiting list people should all protest this. They took out money and the intent of never giving us an apartment.

Anonymous said...

You get your $50 (or whatever the nominal fee it is) returned to you. It is not a lot of money.

Anonymous said...

True, $50 is not a lot of money...

Anonymous said...

Yes, the rules are not are based on income for one year, period. Not based on one''s wealth. Then after you get the apartment you can stay even if your income goes way up. Also, if you have $10 million but only earned $50k for the qualifying year, you still can qualify.

Anonymous said...

There was definitely outcry about the other conversions. Look it up. The point is, your money didn't build the buildings and enable you to purchase them so cheap. Everyone else's money did. Add up the bill for acquisition, development, construction, taxes, etc. The money you paid amounts to pennies. Also, the waiting lists were sometimes managed with a conflict of interests.

Anonymous said...

Selfish and shameful. There are people who work full time jobs and still need to live in homeless shelters and some of these people want to cash in at the expense of everyone else.

Your friends and partners said...

Members of the Board,

It was nice having lunch with you the other day. We'd be happy to host you again whenever you are available. Just as before, lunch is on us, of course. Our offer still stands and we're open to negotiation.

As we said, we have a number of investors who are eager to work with you. Here are their email addresses in case their messages get caught in your spam filters: ben.shaoul@magnumres.com, jared.kusner@kushnercompanies.com, jared.kushner@trump.com (alt), steven.croman@9300realty.com, raphael.toledano@brookhillproperties.com, terrence.lowenberg@iconrealtymgmt.com, or todd.cohen@iconrealtymgmt.com.

We recommend that you stick to the talking points we provided but let us know if you need any help with the tenants who want to vote against leaving. We work with a few people who specialize in dealing with such things. You can reach two of them directly at anthony.falconite@9300realty.com or newton.hinds@brookhillproperties.com.

Anonymous said...

10:45 - You omitted NYU, Cooper Union, The New School. After privatization, whoever is left, will be living in Village View Dorm. How does that sound to all the aging East Villagers. What to expect - parties, noise, vomit - what everyone else is experiencing in the East Village today. We have a little piece of Heaven, why not screw it up for everyone with your GREED. The names of the Board Members should be published for all to know and shame.

Anonymous said...

No, I was around for both conversions of Coop Village and SouthBridge and there was extremely low public outcry in both cases. Just a couple of articles in the local papers describing both sides' viewpoints with no follow up at all. South Bridge had a close vote but that was resolved with very little media coverage at all. In both cases the maintenance payments have not increased so everyone who has remained, their costs have not gone up even if inflation has. (which is not always the case, and is always a risk.)

Anonymous said...

Village View is 50 years old. The electricity and plumbing is original. The board has put money into the lobbies, not the infrastructure. There will be increases. After the first couple of years the sales will go down, and the money will dry out. Who will pay for the plumbing and electricity, plus all the other regular expenses. The maintenance / rent will go up. Don't let them fool you. Don't forget the roofs. And who will pay for the 21 new doormen. The new people will want doormen and a much cleaner building. that means more porters.

Anonymous said...

1:41: The point is, your money didn't build the buildings and enable you to purchase them so cheap. Everyone else's money did. Add up the bill for acquisition, development, construction, taxes, etc. The money you paid amounts to pennies. Also, the waiting lists were sometimes managed with a conflict of interests.

Anonymous said...

There are a lot of valid and important reasons to not privatize these buildings. However, that there were "conflicts of interests" in regards to the waiting lists is NOT one of them. Blaming the tenants of the Village View for the actions of the management is like blaming the owner of a car for the actions of the car's manufacturer. Let's keep some perspective here.

Brian said...

3:00pm, in the 1950s and onward, the Mitchell Lama legislation and law specifically addressed the issues of privatization after a certain period, giving the coop shareholders the option to convert from limited equity to opt out of ML recognizing that the shareholders would gain the full equity in exchange for paying their full share of property taxes and taking them off state control. That was the intent of the program. It gave the shareholders an incentive to take care of the property. That is why these properties do not fall into disrepair lime other public housing projects. Now you want to take that away.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, but a mismanaged wait list is completely relevant. Especially, when management of the list means you control who gets to cash the lottery ticket. Donnie, again with the selective reading glasses. Are you saying the majority of the costs and risk were borne by the tenants? Your response does not address 3:00's point.

Anonymous said...

I saying that the law is on the current shareholders side and the plan from the start was for the shareholders to have this option, so there should not be there "SHAME SHAME" outcry. And there are reasons why the shareholders were given this option as an incentive to manage the property and keep it up for decades before the option became available. That was to keep the buildings upkeep and well maintained and in financial order so that it would benefit the surrounding community. I am saying the shareholder kept their bargain and deserve to have the option and ownership more than any other people do. (And they did put some money into it. They pay maintenance fee every month and they paid an initial fee to purchase shares.) Now as far as the average New Yorker state citizen has given to VV per year, let's see that may amount to 66 cents a year?

Marcos said...

12:55, I think you are trying to address the point and are not being willfully ignorant. It's not easy to create affordable housing. People expend political capital, fight for small allocation of funds, and make difficult compromises in order for it to exist. So while that might be the technical arrangement, that doesn't mean that it emerged that way on purpose. The fact that a tenant must reside in the property is the incentive to manage and maintain it, not the shameful windfall they might reap. Are you saying that public housing buildings are in disrepair because of their tenants and not because they are underfunded? The secret sauce at Village View is not the tenants, it's the combination of public subsidies, capped resale, AND a more lenient AMI restriction. Did the shareholders keep their bargain by honestly maintaining the waiting list, by properly vetting income restrictions, and by policing improper sublets? I think an audit would reveal otherwise. I'm not sure if you're serious about your last point. Are you saying it's OK because you're only taking a little bit on a per person basis? It IS as shameful what happened at Rivington House, which was also technically legal.

Anonymous said...

I just moved into Village View last year. I moved here to ensure that I can live independently as anaging adult. Now you want me to start anew, because some board member want to move to Florida, and other shareholders want to give money to their children. What about the rest of us? Perhaps those of us who have not had our 20 years plus here should file a class action lawsuit and sue the City of New York for not informing us that we would have to move a couple of years after getting here. I would have stayed where I was. After privatization I will have to move to where Florida? Because I won't be able to live here or anywhere else in the City of New York. As an artist I contributed to this community and now I will be run out town. That is why these people need to be shamed, including the City of New York. I should have been informed that this will be happening. I would never have come here. Just thinking about his is making people anxious and sick. Shame on everyone, who is giving permission for this atrocity to go forward without any thought about what will happen to people like me.

Anonymous said...

You are in. You are fine. You really need to educate yourself instead of worry yourself to death about this. And shaming other people out of fear. You are in.

Anonymous said...

The tenants have absolutely nothing to do with the wait-list. Why should they be punished for that?

Anonymous said...

1:34

Tell me what you know about the maintenance. What about the MCI increases for the old infrastructure? Privatizing the electricity, and the gas? Don't tell me not to shame others. Many have lived here for 50 years and now want to give money to their children, others want to leave NY, others have another place to live. All these people are going to profit. Now there is a surcharge for people that make more money, they said that that will be going away. So these people making more money will be paying less after the privatization, because the surcharge is going away. Village View will be for the rich, like everything else in NYC. How boring that will be. Maybe you are right, maybe it will be too boring to live here.

Anonymous said...

In what universe is the current arrangement a punishment? What about policing of improper subletting? Was that part of the bargain upheld?

11:00, good luck to you. I hope that you do not experience intimidation.

Anonymous said...

It's becoming difficult to figure out who's yelling at who in this thread.

Anonymous said...

11:00, It is complicated to understand. Speak to your councilman 's office and fellow VV shareholder who know what they are talking about. Learn as much as you can about the risks and benefits on both sides of the issue. Personally, I think you hit the jackpot. Privatization is a nontaxable event. You will be handed over an asset worth over half a million without having to pay any of the usual transfer fees or taxes. You will have a lot of flexibility with the life choices you can make with the option of being able to sell the apartment on the free market. Good luck. Please keep an open mind for the period you have to make a decision.

Anonymous said...

7:40 - is this FG from the board or another board member. What are you talking about? There is a flip tax, which could be as high as 40% + percentage to metro management for selling the apartment + real estate taxes + maybe capital gains = NOT ENOUGH TO LIVE IN NYC. If you want to leave the city then it is a good deal. With what is left you won't be able to remain in NYC.

Anonymous said...

Deae 1:42 PM on August 10th,

I am talking about the transfer from limited equity to private. See this article --- http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=cb9db742-0510-4904-9019-1c8a252a7397. Also see this article for an explanation: http://www.habitatmag.com/Publication-Content/Legal-Financial/2014/2014-December/No-Transfer-Tax-on-Mitchell-Lama-Exit

Okay? Understand? That pretty much spells it out for you twice. Just cut and paste these 2 articles. Also, the flip taxes after privatization are not typically 40%. Also, if VV handles it right, the maintenance will not go up, just like at Coop Village and South Bridge Towers.

Anonymous said...

There are millions of people making less than 30K living in NYC. If you can't afford to live here, then maybe it is time to move.

Anonymous said...

it would be nice if the "Board" would explain the push to privatize. Elections are coming up. Every board member should be required to state if they are pro or con privatization. They have been hiding behind the answer that " we need more info". The board cannot act with impunity they owe residents an explanation as to why we are looking at privatization, who came up with idea, who on the board supports it etc, etc. stand up VV tenants exercise your rights. Y ou are in danger of losing your home!

Anonymous said...

Question: If you are on the "Waiting List" for Village View Housing is your Spot transferable or saleable to someone else ?

Anonymous said...

Instead of heading out to the suburbs we answered the call to "own" here in the problematic area of the city. We came into this neighborhood when it was a drug hell - no exaggeration. We collectively endured, we cared for each other, kept up our physical plant, and lived in harmony, we raised our kids here, and improved this neighborhood as a desirable place to live....NOW many, many of us we want to own our individual apartments. We "invested" our lives and look forward to having some security now.

Anonymous said...

It is sad day -today our board president announced that Board will stop educational campain about privatisation. It is sad because Board gave in under pressur of small but very loud group opposing privatization. I hope now it is the time to show that there is a large group of shareholders who wants to know more an who wants to have a chance to make inform decision

Anonymous said...

200.00 on list since 2010.
It's a shame housing is so expensive and renting costs out of control. 7 years and still waiting,