Your sponsor owns way too large a percentage of the building especially given the number of years you have been a Coop. This causes all sorts of refi problems with Banks as well. The Sponsor needs to release units for sale on a steady schedule until their footprint is below 20%. This will serve to bring younger family oriented owners in as you have the size apartments they will be shopping for. These new owners will balance out the demographics and be more interested in upgrading amenities that meet their needs such as playgrounds, bike and carriage rooms, indoor reservable party/lounge/playrooms etc. your building is in a static mode and needs a fresh infusion of capital and owners. If necessary you might need a Lawyer to broker a selling-plan deal with the sponsor.

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VP11104 - You are absolutely correct. It does seem excessive for a 57 unit co-op, especially for items that are not an utter necessity in running the building.

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Thank you for your responses. Much of the proposed expense stem from new requirements and lack of a capital improvement program over the years to upgrade our property.
I didn’t provide enough background to the upgrades which we are contemplating.
We have to contend with local law 11, new elevator codes, backflow preventers and subsequent pressure increasing pumps, and work on terraces and facades which are immensely expensive.
We haven’t even started to address aesthetics which are long overdue for improvement.
What other options should we pursue to raise funds for our capital improvements? Residents don’t want maintenance increases or assessments. We have a line of credit available; NCB is not interested in raising the limit. We have no ability to refinance for 18 more months, and have maximized our revenue from garages and storage.
I am open minded, but am concerned that we are not building up cash to implement these improvements – some city mandated, some insurance company mandated, and some board member driven.
Thanks in advance for your feedback, and I look forward to the sponsor selling some apartments.

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I would stick to the important improvements for assessments. You've beeing lucky to assess with 1/2 the building still in the hands of the sponsor to improve the building. Unfortunately, everyone needs to pitch in when improving the building. If your maintenance is still relatively low to comparable locations, an increase in maintenance that may allow you to put money away to build reserves or take care of medium repairs may be a way to go too. Again, I would not object to pay more maintenance if there is a reserve component to it or performance of medium ticket repairs.

The determinant factor in a builidng should not be age of its residents, but the fact that work is required to maintain the value with respect to your neighboring buildings and you will be willing to tackle those projects that are required to maintain the structure and also may add value to the property.

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