Local Law 152 is a Total Sh*tShow

2020 is the year when gas piping inspections mandated by Local Law 152 of 2016 started being required.  

The law technically became effective in 2017, but it took the Department of Buildings two years to establish the rules by which Licensed Master Plumbers would be certified to conduct the inspections, the inspection protocols themselves, and, presumably, the inspection reports themselves.

This law feels like the culmination of the City Council's attempt to "fix" the issues that lead to catastrophic natural gas explosions in 2014 (Harlem) and 2015 (East Village).  

We've seen many changes at the Dept of Buildings levels, like that time in 2016 when DOB unilaterally started rejecting plumbing permit applications if the boiler of the subject building didn't have a permitted boiler with an exact serial number on file. No notice.

Then came the rule that no one is allow to shut off a gas meter to a building except a licensed plumber and that ConEd had to be notified immediately (or called to do the shut down themselves). That's a law. 

Next came the law that ConEd can't do any turn-ons until the Department of Buildings receives a valid permit and witnesses a gas pipe integrity inspection. So, suddenly your little turn off of the meter just to address one little thing has turned into a multi-month process, *if* you have the correct previous permits for your boiler (see above) and the gas piping itself. (that's two different permits, FYI, because the boiler may have been replaced on the same piping).

If you don't have either, then you have to re-file all the gas piping in your building.  Enter an engineer for several thousand dollars.  You get the work done (more thousands), then you get your inspection hopefully. You rarely pass the first time. Or, if you do pass, you get to apply for your blue card, and you might have to re-file the application wording so that it's just so.  

In a recent application that required zero work, just a gas integrity test to restore service after a prior tenant terminated their account, my plumber was forced to re-file the permit 3 times to reference various prior permits, and to get the language just right. Each time it cost $35. I got lucky because the piping was modern and was already up to code.  

For older buildings, luck has run out, and it gets tougher the older the building is, because in some cases still-functional gas piping could be approaching 100 years old, and law prohibits repair of gas piping - only full replacement from meter to appliance. 

If you notice above, to replace gas piping you must shut off the meter. That can only be done by ConEd, and turn-on can only occur after Dept of Buildings has witnessed an integrity test.

The complexity of the process all but guarantees that people will resist upgrading their gas infrastructure for as long as possible.

So, I guess, into the breach comes Local Law 152. The law, at the time I heard it, sounded like the inspection was intended to proactively find leaks and dangerous conditions where a pipe was about to corrode away. Licensed plumbers would do this by inspecting with a sniffer, "...public spaces, hallways, corridors, and mechanical and boiler rooms with a portable combustible gas detector to determine if there is any gas leak..." 

Made sense to me.  Proactively require owners to inspect for imminently dangerous conditions every 5 years.  

But the law didn't stop there: in addition to immediately hazardous conditions such as leaks or badly corroded pipes, or illegal installations (think garden hose connections, like the one that caused the East Village explosion in 2015), the plumber is required to also report "...any observed non-code compliant installations..."  

There is the beef!  New York City is FULL of non-code compliant installations... because over the decades there have been many updates to the building code!  And these installations are considered grandfathered, so long as they are safe. But the law seems to say (and inspections are being conducted as if) it is the modern day code that these inspections must occur under.

But the law appears to disallow what were formerly stable, grandfather gas installations of yesteryear: The law requires "non-code compliant installations" to be fixed immediately, and it only gives a 120 day window (plus 180 days if a plumber certifies that it is necessary) to get it done. That's 10 months. 

That's not enough time - by a long shot - to replace gas piping in an occupied building. More on that later.

Every building over a 2-family dwelling in NYC has to be inspected - 3 or 4 community boards at a time  (This year it's all buildings that fall into CB 1, 3 or 10), in each of the 5 boroughs, each YEAR. 

That's thousands of buildings, each year, that will be reported to have non-compliant installations. And to fix those issues, it will require engineering plans, permits, and a building shutdown, to be in compliant with the rest of the building codes. The process takes more than 6-10 months. Sorry, City Council, but it does. Even with the move to digital permit filing at the DOB, it takes a really long time. What to hear a potential real-life scenario? Keep reading.

Let's not forget we are having a COVID-19 pandemic. That means we don't know what's happening yet.  Everything that was supposed to start in January got pushed 6-9 months.  Many plumbers, concerned by the amount of responsibility conferred on them by the law, were ambivalent about offering the inspections. And then, when they decided to do it, they had to send their inspectors through a certification class. Hence, many inspectors just came on line in late summer and early fall. And they are just starting to file their preliminary reports. No news back from DOB about shutdowns on code compliance.

The leak is just turning into a trickle.

Many building owners just aren't thinking about it. The deadline to file the first inspection report is December 31. Plumbers are just starting to get those calls. They don't have much time get to things fixed before the the inspection reports are due.

Personal experience so far: One building dating back into the mid-1800s - is mandated to do the Local Law 152 inspections this year. We have done it and have no leaks or serious corrosion. But there are code issues (on the 80+ year old pipes with no corrosion). The pipes have some steel fittings.  Steel is no longer code to use in gas piping. It would seem we are mandated to replace these... in 10 months. We could keep the gas on while the plans and permits were being prepared, but then... shut down.  

Here's where my other real life experience kicks in for extrapolation of likely outcome: If lucky, the work would take a month to do (we'd be somewhere around January/February by then... great time to turn off the heat), then we get our first inspection. Then our second (there's always a second inspection). They decide a boiler inspection is necessary, even though no work was done on a boiler. Then maybe a third. We pass, finally. It's probably nearly May. We apply for gas authorization. We are asked to revise the permit language. Maybe to reference a permit that doesn't exist in the records.  A few more weeks (this has happened to me. Not just making it up, friends). Finally we get gas authorization.  ConEd comes to the building to check the conditions. If we're lucky, it's good to go. The turn-on happens in 48-72 hours. 

But maybe ConEd feel like the meter bars need replacing. Or maybe, they decide the building is "underserviced" (meaning the gas pipe coming into the building is too small for the gas load).  They say it's not dangerous. Changes need to be made.  They won't turn the gas on. Or they will turn on the heating meter but not the cooking gas stoves. Until ANOTHER permit is filed, ANOTHER shutdown is done, so that they can upgrade something that the utility is responsible for.

Again, I'm not throwing out any possibility that I haven't personally witnessed happening in a building, in sequence! All of these things have happened in my buildings. And not all have old piping!

Doesn't DOB know this is how it goes? 

Did the City Council think about this when they wrote the law this way? I'm sure the Plumbers Association told them. Did they assume everyone who owns a building in New York is rich (even after they take 50-60% of the income in yearly property taxes?)

Feels like a feel-good law that had momentum in the wake of two tragedies.  But it defies reality.

Next question:

What is the DOB going to do when they see thousands of reports of non-compliant piping in buildings that aren't about to blow up? 

Nothing dangerous, just old pipes that you don't have to replace just this minute. Steel pipes. Pipes that have plugs or joints that aren't legal now, but were then? These little things can't just be replaced - the whole pipe has to be replaced from stem to stern.

Another predictable scenario: the owners paid for the inspection, but they just can't afford or manage the wholesale replacement of their building's gas pipes in 10 months.

A job of this type requires planning. It requires informing tenants and getting their buy-in. It might require relocating fragile tenants. If you try to keep tenants in place, you have $15,000-$20,000/month in portable heating to budget in. On top of up to $10,000 for engineering drawings and permits, and whatever the work costs.

What if the building can't afford to do the shutdown work because 30% of the tenants haven't paid rent due to the pandemic? what if it's full of seniors in rent stabilized apartments?  Or children? What if it's a self-managed co-op with middle-income owner-occupants?

Do they all get shut down? Fined? 

The plumber says about 80% of the building's he's inspected so far (hundreds) have issues that would require a shut down to fix. 

Do we have wholesale punitive shutdowns in CB 1, 3 and 10 in each borough this year?  As a sort of example to the other CBs?  Get a fire lit (no pun intended) to get those gas pipes modernized?  

I don't know.  No one knows, because the law, and subsequent DOB guidelines, say nothing about it.

My opinion is that an amendment should be passed immediately that stipulates that buildings with non-code compliant, but stable, piping, should be allowed to stay that way until the next 5-year inspection, or permitted construction, whichever comes first.

The way the law is written, thousands are wondering if their gas is going to be shut off this winter.

And no one knows who to ask.

Washing Machines - When do they become Standard Issue?

There's been a bit of coverage about in-apartment amenities as a result of COVID-19.  There was this Washington Post article that talked about one New Yorker who couldn't stand not having a washer/dryer in her apartment anymore.  Another broker linked to this Slate article - the top pullout quote is "A Washer Dryer Is a Social Distancing Dream Machine."

And so they are. Also a major adulting tool.  (I am doxing myself as someone who, faced with going downstairs to my apartment's laundry room, will simply order more underwear online to delay the process another week). 

The WaPo touches the heart of it by quoting the New Yorker saying "“It’s just insulting to come at us and be like, ‘We’re going to charge you an extra thousand dollars a month for this standard appliance that’s been in American households since the 1970s.’ ”

But, it's not so simple.

WARNING: I'm about to get detailed here.

Most apartment buildings in New York City were built before 1945, and most have been continuously occupied since then.  What does that have to do with in-apartment washing machines?  Well, it makes the whole thing a lot more complicated.

That's because apartments share both supply (what comes out of your faucet) and waste (drain) plumbing.  The waste stacks, as they are called, run behind the walls of the apartments from the top floor apartment to the bottom, and down below to where they join the main sewer waste.  When your upstairs neighbor takes a shower or a ... you know... that's how it leaves the building.

Ok, so, now the landlord/co-op owner wants to add an in-apartment laundry.  They need:

• permission to install laundry in unit (co-ops/condos)
• the space inside the apartment
• proximity to the drainage pipes
• the right size waste pipes

And that last item is the sticky wicket. Simply put, adding washing machines from top to bottom will generally overwhelm the existing drain plumbing that was installed 50-80 years ago. The amount of water discharged by washing machines can lead to drains backing up into the sinks and tubs of the unit below. Current building codes provide a complicated cross-table of number of fixtures drained to drainage to pipe-diameter value. 

Since wall space for burying pipes is generally limited, in most cases, the only answer would be to expose the existing kitchen waste pipe from top floor to bottom and replace it with a properly sized pipe (with appropriate vents for soap bubbles). This requires permits, engineering planning, and probably ancillary construction (ie, if you go through a kitchen wall you probably must rip out the cabinets to get to the pipe; if you go through a bathroom wall, the whole wall must be re-tiled).

Plus, all apartments top to bottom need to be worked on at the same time. Why? Old pipes may be too corroded to take a clean cut, meaning connections to newer pipe would rot out and cause leaks inside the walls. In addition, if the pipes need to be sized up, building code mandates that pipes only get bigger as you go down (so that there is never a bottleneck or clog).  So, you can't put a larger pipe above a smaller pipe. 

So, retrofitting for in-apartment laundry is very costly. If a washer is a deal-breaker for you, stick to newer construction buildings that were constructed to have laundry in every apartment.  Unfortunately, that is where the rents are highest.

Saving small businesses in New York: what are the solutions? - Curbed NY

This thoughtful article doesn't have all the answers to the mall-ification of NYC, but I think it has some good ideas and does a really great job pointing out the issues, and discussing some ideas that have been proposed to help small retail businesses thrive.



As manager of a couple properties with small retail businesses in their store fronts, I am pretty familiar with the struggles.  The idea that banks won't finance new construction unless "credit tenants" (aka national retailers such as banks or drug stores or big brands) anchor the retail was news but not a surprise to me.  Now we see why every time a new condo goes up, Starbucks goes in on the ground floor (not that I'm complaining, mind you!).



As for some of the solutions, well, I feel they cause additional issues. Mandatory 10 year leases aren't likely to work - because people who start small businesses have high failure rates and won't make it to 10 years in business. So then banks considering mortgages will discount the values of those 10 year mortgages.



Mandating one three-year extension at the outset of the initial lease might fly. But how does that do anything but pass the buck down the road, when retail rents have gone further up and the small business must somehow make an even bigger jump?


Mayor De Blasio made some noise last week about charging landlords who "keep their storefronts empty" waiting for tenants who will pay high rents. How does he decide on who is doing that?  Is there a mandatory time frame? A specific asking rent that would trigger the charge? A combination of the two?  Do they spend money every year indexing average asking rents in various neighborhoods?  Obviously asking a Soho rent in the Bronx is unrealistic, but what's an outrageous Soho rent?



The idea of giving FAR bonuses to landlords who are going to include retail has legs. There are a lot of neighborhoods - mine included - where retail storefronts are in need.  Whether it's a small or large business in that store front, we could use more stores!  So why not allow any building on a large (perhaps defined as 4-lane, two way streets?)  automatically have a commercial zoning for the ground floor, and allow the developer a bonus sq footage?  It's likely to benefit the neighborhood better than the "plaza" bonuses, many of which plazas remain shuttered to the public even after heavy coverage from a few years ago.



Another option mentioned was the implementation of restrictions of proximity for ubiquitous businesses such as banks in certain areas.  I grew up in a small town in Northern Virginia that had such an ordinance - against fast food restaurants.  They couldn't be less than 500 feet from each other.  So when Taco Bell wanted open up about 400 feet from the existing McDonalds - well, that was a fight (that resulted in a variance allowing Taco Bell to open, although the McDonalds eventually relocated further away and a carpet store took over its old space.). But overall I think it did do something for our little town. So, as then-Councilwoman Brewer said, "it's one tool in the toolbox."



I would like to see a bit more self-policing from landlords - especially long time landlords who have substantial equity in their properties and aren't faced with a refinance every few years.  Have 3 storefronts? Try to get or preserve a small business in one of them.  Lobby for tax breaks for long term tenancies of small (fewer than 3 locations) businesses.  I'll point out that since landlords with commercial spaces must submit Real Property Income & Expense statements annually to the city - disclosing rent rolls and income - their property taxes are already determined based on existing income, so lower rents *should* result in lower property taxes.  In other words, if your property isn't beholden to a mortgage bank, then you can afford a slightly lower retail rent.



Ultimately, it's going to take agreement among many stakeholders to achieve a new equilibrium that saves NYC from going suburban.



Saving small businesses in New York: what are the solutions? - Curbed NY:



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Landmarks Commission begins overhaul of application process | Crain's New York Business

I have to say this would be a very welcome development.  I recently had to help a business through a number of landmarks processes and all I can say is it took a LOT of time.  Thankfully this building did not require going through a public hearing, but I have to wonder how does it help the city?  It certainly doesn't keep the costs of maintaining the property down, and as a result Landmark Districts are among the most expensive to live in in the city.



I suspect this "overhaul" is going to consist of very low hanging fruit (such as the window review process mentioned in this article). But anything is better than nothing...



Landmarks Commission begins overhaul of application process | Crain's New York Business:



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Second Avenue subway pays dividends for Yorkville landlords, defying Manhattan rent declines | Crain's New York Business

Hard not to say "I told you so" about this.  Unfortunately by the time it gets to the press, the rents are already rising. However I still think that sales in the area are per square foot a bargain over other parts of Manhattan!





Second Avenue subway pays dividends for Yorkville landlords, defying Manhattan rent declines | Crain's New York Business:



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Announcing Solid State Properties LLC!

Effective immediately, I'm proud to announce that I have started my own company, Solid State Properties LLC, to continue the focus on small property management in Mid and Lower Manhattan, and parts of Brooklyn as well.

Solid State Properties LLC is a New York City based property management and brokerage firm specializing in Manhattan and Brooklyn properties under 6 stories. Whether it's a single condominium unit, a mixed use property, small co-op or small office building, we practice efficiency of scale and no-nonsense management, and rental brokerage all in one.

2016 Tax Rates by Class

‎In case anyone missed it:



NOTICE RECEIVED THROUGH REBNY (REAL ESTATE BOARD OF NEW YORK) 

The City Council adopted real property tax rates for fiscal year 2016, which begins July 1, 2015.  Here are the 2016 tax rates by class as well as last year's rates for comparison.   Tax Rates by Class Please note that the tax bills issued for the first half of fiscal year 2016 (July 2015 through December 2015) were based on the fiscal year 2015 tax rates. As a result, your second half tax bill will be based on the recently adopted fiscal year 2016 tax  rates and will include an adjustment for any overpayment or underpayment in  the first half of the year.

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My Own Non-Scientific Take on the City-Verizon Spat

I've been following Crain's NY Business' chronicle of the fight that the De Blasio administration is picking with Verizon over its failure to roll out FIOS citywide. In a nutshell, Verizon struck an agreement with the Bloomberg administration in 2008 to install fiber optic cable (trademark FiOS) internet access throughout the city, ostensibly so that areas served by only one cable provider (Time Warner, Cablevision, etc.) will have another choice.  This makes sense on the face of it. After all, cable companies are currently the only broadband providers in certain areas. Sure, you can go with another "provider" if you want - you might get mailings announcing "alternatives", but the fact is that in most areas, those companies have to rent capacity from the main cable company in the area, for the simple reason that those are the only cables in the ground.

My bugaboo with the whole scheme is that while attempting to lay all this fiber, Verizon has completely neglected the existing copper wire network that runs throughout New York. It is falling apart - and that fact is not being covered all that extensively.  One article in Ars Technica from 2014 mentions it briefly, as does the above Crain's article, again, briefly.

Let me paint a picture at how bad it has gotten by talking about two buildings that my firm manages. The first is on West 11th in Greenwich Village, a building with residential and business tenants.  At least every two months, and sometimes more often (depends on the weather conditions), I am forced to meet a Verizon repair tech at this building to let them through an apartment to the back, where they try to find a "good pair" in the phone box. This box is older than the hills, and it's full of rust. But when I have asked about replacing said box, I'm told that Verizon isn't replacing ANY copper phone equipment.

The problem is sometimes within the line between the building and the hub, which is an apartment building on the next block south. The tech must then go back and forth between this building and that, trying to find a connection that will hold. Once, I was told it was not the box, but the line between the hub and the box, which - in contradiction to Verizon's claims in the articles - runs above ground. You can see the phone wire strung all along the back yards of the block! When the line "goes bad" - meaning that it gets exposed and nicked/broken somehow - the tech has to "splice" it, meaning cutting the damaged part of the line out and basically taping the two ends together.  The tech who told me about the line said "that line has so many splices in it I don't know how it still works."  When I asked about getting a new copper line run - yes, you guessed it!  "They're not replacing anything."

 So, the tenants in this building constantly lose the phone service they pay so much for. And it's not just that building! My firm manages an adjacent building that has also had similar phone problems.

I looked into FiOS as an option to get away from the crumbling infrastructure and found to my amazement (though not so much now that I've been reading articles telling of similar experiences all around the city) that FiOS is NOT available on that block. This blew my mind. I understand that Verizon may not wish to wire every small building right off the bat (though seven years in one would hope they'd made some headway), but this building is right between two major thoroughfares - Fifth and Sixth Avenues - that surely must have fiber available? They don't have to bring it that far, and they have a building manager - ME - who is willing to get them access - all so they don't have to waste thousands of dollars visiting this building's back yard every six to eight weeks. Recently I head that another building towards Fifth Ave had successfully managed to get FiOS installed. How did they do that?

Which leads me to the other building, also on Fifth Avenue in the Flatiron. This building is not a large office building but it happens to have line running through it that serves some adjacent buildings as well. Within the past two months I have had at least five technicians needing access to that basement to repair copper phone and data connections! Again, I am completely shocked. The copper here in Silicon Alley is no better maintained (though it is apparently underground)! And I listen to the techs speaking with their home office, trying again to find "good lines". There isn't enough capacity to service all the commercial and residential tenants in that block!  The tech suggested I try to get some of them to sign up for "fiber", which would alleviate the crowded copper box.

Today I had a conversation with a very nice lady from the Verizon business office, and she informed me that she knew "no more FiOS installations were being scheduled for the rest of the year".  !!!!!!  In the meantime Verizon is spending millions of dollars running fiber "past" buildings but telling potential customers that it's not available to them. What kind of shell game is that? It reminds me of the recent scandal about the military contractors who built all kinds of equipment that only got destroyed once it was shipped to the Middle East. And all the money spent on advertising a service that no one can get? There's just no answer to that.

Following which, I might as well air my frustration at the fact that I am seeing many many of those little internet antennae popping up all over the place in Manhattan subway stations... but I am not getting any service!  I travel all over the city (forget the fact that not a single underground station in Brookyn has service), and I have seen these tell-tale signs of service in Washington Heights, East Harlem, and the Lower East Side - some for eight months or longer - but zero bars in any of these stations (I'm looking at YOU Second Avenue!).

I've said before that Transit Wireless' strategy seems completely haphazard. Their blog states that they have begun installing equipment in Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, but their Lower East Side stations? Nary a word - oh wait, I see that Delancy is part of the Phase 3 rollout - but no announcement as to when that will happen?

Oh, and the website www.NYCSubwayWireless.com seems to have been hijacked, or given up. It takes you to a website about call forwarding. It does not, as suggested on the Transit Wireless website, show you which stations have service.

How Much Higher Can Rents Go if Manhattan Wages Keep Falling?

According to the US Labor Department, employment in Manhattan increased, but wages have fallen because fewer jobs were added back in the finance industry. Overall private sector wages fell 3.3% in Manhattan.  

What does this mean for the crazy rents that we see throughout Manhattan? And the crazy home valuations? It could mean bad things. Sure, there are still tons of foreign buyers snapping up townhouses and condos in Manhattan; but that's still a small fraction of the people who live on the island. So... eventually... either we get a new extreme high wage-paying industry to employ lots of people.... or finance resurges in Manhattan.... or rents are going to have to come down.

It has been a strange year in Manhattan so far. Rents slipped quite a bit in November to a new 7 year high, which is par for the course, but Manhattan landlords were introducing incentives as late as February 2014.
According to Elliman's monthly report, May 2014 vacancy rates were just a tick lower than May 2013, and actually .13% higher than April 2014.  Some articles made mention that Brooklyn rents and Manhattan rents came close to equal during this time, suggesting that many Manhattanites are decamping to Brooklyn. But ultimately, it may simply be that rents are just too damn high, especially since the people who could afford the sky-high rents, and all the amenities, are less and less likely to be working in Manhattan.

I'm not saying that rents are going to fall off a cliff. New York is still the place to be and many people from all over the world locate here. And there is still a housing shortage, albeit an affordable housing shortage. The first developments to be squeezed will be the mid-range developments, those renting for $3500-$7000/month. The danger is that we might start to see more high end rentals than affordable developments, for the same reason that high end condo developments have proliferated in this city over middle class ownership housing: the middle class is getting squeezed, wages are falling, and the rich are the ones we can count on to have money.

But the 1% is only a single percent, so eventually rents will have to fall a little. Or even a lot. At least until New York finds its next big wage paying industry.

How Much Should You Borrow Based on What You Want to Pay Monthly

So you hear a lot about relative cost to rent versus cost to buy, but really, you're thinking... What can I afford?  Or, more likely, how much can I borrow but still pay the same amount in mortgage as in rent?  Today I want to show you a quick and dirty way to figure that out.

First, take your monthly amount of rent. Let's say $3000 for a round number.

Then, you need to subtract something to represent the maintenance (for a coop), or common charges + property taxes (for a condo) that you might be paying. This amount varies a great deal based on the size of the property that you are looking at. Common amounts are $500-$800 for a one bedroom or $800 - $1000 for a two bedroom, and go up from there. 

Let's say we're looking at a one-bedroom and want to be conservative, so we'll take $800 as the number. $3000-$800=$2200.  Notice we didn't include insurance. This is because homeowners policies are not a very big jump from renters insurance policies, so we'll assume that cost remains the same. (If you don't have a renter's insurance policy, you should seriously consider getting one up - your belongings are not covered by the landlord's insurance policy if they are stolen or destroyed).

So we have a principal and interest payment of $2200. Now, we look at the current interest rates. Your bank's website can provide those to you. Keep in mind two things: 1) interest rates change daily and 2) when the economy is good, interest rates tend to move up.  So if you are doing this exercise for a future purchase six months from now, you might want to add .25%-.5% just to be safe. (of course you can always buy the interest rate back down if you have the cash and the desire).

At the moment I am writing this, I just clicked over to the Bankrate.com website. Bankrate is an independent web site that publishes information about mortgage rates across many banks and regions of the US. Keep in mind that New York rates may be different from the national average. Coop loan rates are usually higher, as are condo loans, though somewhat less so.  Indeed, Bankrate gives me a range of 3.97%-4.89%, while the national average is listed as 4.29%.

Let's again be conservative and use 4.75% as our rate. Now, we flip over to http://www.realestate-calc.com/Mortgage_Calculators/Mortgage_Amortization.asp, where we find a nicely laid out table of the cost per $1000 borrowed. Scroll down to 4.75 in the first column, then slide your finger over to the 30-year column (all the way to the right). The number is $5.22. That means for every $1000 you borrow at 4.75% interest rate, your monthly payment is $5.22 for a 30 year self-amortizing loan (meaning when you hit the last payment of the 30 year loan, you have paid off the loan).

Ok, so now we take your monthly rent payment less allowance for monthly maintenance fees (remember that? $3000-$800=$2200), and we divide $2200 by $5.22. So in other words, we are seeing how many thousands of dollars we can service with the $2200 we already pay.  The answer? 421.456. Just multiply that by $1000 (or  move the decimal over 3 places) and you'll get $421,456, which is the amount of mortgage you can carry, plus maintenance charges and (if condo) property taxes.  

Now let's take that one step further. You generally need a 20% down payment to get a mortgage. Most coops require that at least 20% be put down. Condos might only require 10% (some coops do as well, but banks have become more stringent since 2008 and it's harder to get a 90% mortgage on a coop than it once was).

The amount of mortgage that we figured, $421,456, represents 80% of the total cost of the property that you can purchase. This is the maximum loan to value ratio (or LTV) that most loans allow. Dividing that number by four tells us what 20% of the total price must be. Answer: $105,364.

To get 100% of potential purchase price, we multiply that number by five. (because 5 x 20% = 100%). So $105,364 x 5 = $526,820.

So, the total purchase price that you can likely afford while still keeping  a similar housing payment to what you pay in rent is $526,820. This assumes a down payment of $105,364 (the 20% number we calculated earlier).

In the hottest parts of Manhattan, this will get you a studio or a small one bedroom. In northern Manhattan, this will get you even a two bedroom. Even in Brooklyn, you can score a very nicely sized one bedroom or even two bedroom depending on area (though probably not in Williamsburg, alas).  So if you feel you can't afford to buy, think again. You can afford to buy if you can afford to rent at Manhattan's prices.