13 Upper East Side Penthouse Apartments

Penthouse Apartments for Sale in NYC

Any top-floor apartment in NYC can be marketed as a penthouse, from a 650-square-foot studio on the 6th floor to a 5,000-square-foot full-floor residence in a 60-story tower. After 25+ years representing buyers in Central Park South, Tribeca, and across the outer boroughs, I advise every penthouse buyer to evaluate four factors: private outdoor space quality, mechanical equipment on the roof above, roof membrane condition, and the thermal exposure that comes with a top-floor position.

What $2 Million Buys in Upper East Side

Between $1.6M and $2.4M, the band a $2 million budget actually shops in, this page currently holds 2 apartments. Those figures come from the live RLS listings rendered on this page and move with them, so they are a reading of today's inventory rather than a market average over time.

The ownership split decides most of the rest: 5 of these are co-ops and 8 are condominiums. A co-op purchase goes through a board that reviews your finances, can cap how much you finance, and sets the sublet policy, and a flip tax of roughly 1% to 3% is set by the building. A condominium removes the board review and the financing cap, which matters for a purchase through a trust or an entity and for an easier resale to a financed buyer, and usually costs more per square foot for the same apartment.

Before you go to contract in either product, ask for the last two years of board or condominium minutes, the reserve fund balance, and any pending assessment. Facade, elevator, and roof work on an older building arrives as an assessment rather than a surprise, and those documents are where it shows up first. If a co-op is on your list, the co-op versus condo comparison lays out how board review, financing caps, and flip taxes change the arithmetic at this price.