When buying an apartment in New York City, often my clients come and ask me what the difference is between a co-op and a condo. In a condominium, each individual unit is granted as its own fee, so when you record the deed, each unit has its own deed. Whereas in a cooperative, what you really are buying is not your apartment, but rather, you’re buying stock in a corporation and by virtue of your ownership in the stock in that corporation, you have a lease to occupy your unit. Unlike a condominium where you own your apartment in fee simple, a co-op situation is a cooperative corporation that owns the whole building and you have a license to live in your apartment. Co-ops are also much more restrictive typically than condos in their processes of admission of new owners. Condos tend to be much more permissive.
This informational blog post was provided by Alexis Soterakis, an experienced New York Corporate Business Law Attorney.
