Co-op Shareholders Can Get Cash from a HELOC? Hell, Yeah.

Sept. 4, 2014 — HELOC may sound like a successor to Marvel Comics' espionage agency SHIELD — and Headquarters for Eurasian, Latin-American and Oceanic Control does sound pretty cool — but it stands for, rather, "home equity line of credit." In the case of co-ops, says a National Cooperative Bank loan officer writing in BrickUnderground.com, this differs from a traditional mortgage refinance in that, first, co-op loans aren't mortgages, and, second, you can borrow small amounts, effectively treating your apartment "like a credit card." It's also unlike a traditional refinancing, he says, in that it only costs only a few hundred bucks to set up. While some co-op boards naysay HELOCs, most, he asserts, will OK them up to a certain percentage of your apartment’s appraised value.