66 Norton Sells For $1.46M

A Brooklyn-based landlord paid $1.46 million to buy the 40-unit apartment complex at 66 Norton St., which has been empty for the past two years after the city first declared the building structurally unsafe.

According to the city land records database, on Dec. 24, the Coney Island Avenue-based holding company 66 Norton LLC purchased the five-story 66 Norton St. complex from 66 Norton Apartments LLC, a holding company owned by fellow Brooklyn-based landlord Ernest Schemitsch.

New ownership representative and prospective building manager Michael Zolty said that his company plans to start pulling building permits in the next few weeks to undertake requisite structural repairs to the complex’s bathrooms and kitchens.

He said the new owners plan to have the building renovated and cleared for accepting new tenants by this upcoming summer.

“We plan to take care of any underlying issues at the property,” he said. ​“We’re confident after speaking with the Building Department that we’ll be able to correct it and have it ready to rent by the summer.”

The city Building Department issued an emergency order to vacate the low-income apartment complex in Feb. 2018 after a routine city inspection and subsequent structural analysis revealed that the building was no longer safe to inhabit because of sagging floors, ceiling leaks, and rotting wood.

Eighty tenants living in 33 apartment units at the complex had just 45 minutes to pack their essential belongs and leave the building.

Many spent the next few weeks living out of area motels as the building’s former management and the city’s Livable City Initiative worked to provide permanent relocation assistance.

Nearly two years later, the building is still vacant, with danger signs posted by its front door and surrounded by a chainlink fence.

In Feb. 2019, the former landlord pulled a nearly $7,200 residential rehabilitation permit from the city’s Building Department. According to the city’s building permit database, city Building Official Jim Turcio cancelled that permit on Nov. 25 after six months of no construction work following the pulling of the permit.

Zolty said that this is the new landlord’s first real estate acquisition in New Haven. ​“We’re still at the early stages,” he said. ​“Right now, we’re working on taking care of the structural issues.”

When those are complete, he said, he’ll reach out to local real estate brokers and figure out what kinds of rents to charge for this previously almost exclusively low-income complex.

The building last sold in 2015 for $2.5 million. The city last appraised the building as worth $1,414,000.

Mandy Spends Over $2M Buying 11 Properties, 25 Apartments

In other recent property transactions, the affiliates of the local large-scale landlord Mandy Management spent over $2 million buying 11 properties containing 25 different residential units citywide.

Those recent purchases include the six-unit apartment complex at 110 Fairmont Ave., which the Mandy-affiliated company Gur New Haven II LLC bought from Carl Davia’s 110 Fairmont Avenue Associates LLC for $530,769 on Jan 3. The property last sold for $90,000 in 2001, and was last appraised by the city as worth $321,800.

Also on Jan. 3, Gur New Haven II LLC spent $353,846 buying the four-family house at 250 – 266 Quinnipiac Ave. from Davia’s 504 Foxon LLC for $353,846. That property last sold for $200,000 in 2008, and was last appraised by the city as worth $215,500.

On Jan. 3, Gur New Haven II LLC bought three condos at 130 Lexington Ave., Units A, B, and C from Davia for $265,385. Those condos were last appraised by the city as worth a total of $232,000.

Last year, Mandy Management-affiliated companies spent over $16.1 million buying 70 properties containing 186 different apartments citywide.