Taking advantage of tax breaks gave this co-op a bigger budget for energy efficiency work

The J‑51 tax break has the name of an arcane piece of city policy, but for those in the know, it’s a powerful tool for making building reno­va­tions happen. 

The tax abate­ment was first intro­duced in the 1950s to incen­tivize certain New York City building owners to make impor­tant upgrades to aging build­ings, and was just revived at the end of 2024, renamed J‑51 R, with an aim of explic­itly helping qual­i­fying home­owners afford energy effi­ciency reno­va­tions that ulti­mately help reduce carbon emissions. 

Queensview, a 726-unit co-op building in Astoria, was able to take advan­tage of both versions of this tax break for their projects that began in March 2025 — but getting all of their work to qualify was a matter of very precise timing. 

Miles Appelman is a J‑51 expe­d­itor and consul­tant with his own firm based in Long Island. In the course of his 38-year career, he has filed thou­sands of J‑51 and J‑51 R appli­ca­tions for co-ops and condo­miniums in the Bronx and Queens, including for Queensview. 

According to him, one of the key discrep­an­cies between the old J‑51 program and the revived one lay in the scale of the work that must be performed to qualify for the benefit. ​“In the past, you could file for a J‑51 for any work that was in their eligi­bility schedule,” explained Appelman. ​“Now you have to do work that nets at least $1500 [of benefit] for every apart­ment in the building. I find J‑51 R has led to larger projects than in the past.” In the case of Queensview, the complex’s size meant that it had to under­take work costing at least $1 million to even qualify for the benefit.

Compared to the previous iter­a­tion of J‑51, another key chal­lenge of the current J‑51 R program is the rela­tively small window of time for eligible projects, which other New York City co-op share­holders have raised concerns about: The tax break only applies to work completed between June 29, 2022 and June 30, 2026. The Queensview’s projects fell within this window, but even so, they only had four months after project comple­tion to file a successful application. 

To offset the costs of their energy effi­ciency projects, which included elec­trical subme­tering, roof repairs with added insu­la­tion, and the instal­la­tion of a BMS for more precise energy use controls, Queensview was approved for a signif­i­cant tax abate­ment over time. They received a tax break of $353,000 per year for eight years, and $141,000 in the ninth year, for a total savings of nearly $3 million. Having these funds freed up for the capital improve­ments was an enor­mous help, says co-op trea­surer Alicia Fernandez. 

“It is a very detailed and compli­cated process for a prop­erty of our size,” she said. ​“Miles Appelman did a wonderful job for Queensview, for both the J‑51 and the J‑51 R.”

Given this new trun­cated appli­ca­tion process, Appelman advises other owners consid­ering applying for the program to get started on meeting all of the initial require­ments for an appli­ca­tion early — espe­cially the pre-noti­fi­ca­tion require­ment, a notice that must go out to building resi­dents well in advance of any work that describes what type of reno­va­tion project will be happening, and how much it will cost. 

“Pre-notify, pre-notify,” Appelman empha­sized, ​“You have to send out a certi­fied letter to every owner in the building, plus all the rental tenants in the co-op… I yell at my clients everyday: I say, ​‘Guys, if you remember anything about this phone call, get pre-noti­fied before you start — at least 30 days before.’”