Sloan Plaza

Large downtown units are a scarce and specific product

Most downtown condominium stock is compact, because the form exists largely to deliver location at a manageable cost. A building of generous floor plans in the center of a city is therefore serving a buyer that most of the market does not.

That buyer is well defined: somebody leaving a large house who wants to keep the space but not the maintenance, the stairs or the grounds. In this city that frequently means somebody moving in from an established neighborhood — and it is why a building like this one holds its position over decades rather than following fashion.

The scarcity has real consequences for pricing. Because the product is uncommon, the comparable set is thin: there may be few directly comparable sales in a given year, and widening means finding other large downtown units rather than substituting either smaller downtown units or large houses further out. Both of those substitutions misprice, in opposite directions.

An automated valuation will make exactly that error. It finds nearby sales and treats them as evidence, ignoring both what the buyer is paying a premium for and the assessment they are taking on.

So the analysis has to be constructed and argued. For a seller that means naming the product accurately — a large home in the center of the city with the maintenance handled — and identifying genuine comparables rather than accepting whatever a model produces.

For a buyer it means scarcity cuts both ways: it supports value while you own it, and it means fewer alternatives while you are looking.

Building staff, and what that changes

A building with staff is a materially different proposition from one without, and the difference runs through both the daily experience and the budget.

What staff typically provide is a staffed entry and package handling, oversight of contractors and deliveries, maintenance of common areas, and a point of contact when something goes wrong at an inconvenient hour. In practice the package handling alone is worth a great deal to people who travel, and the presence of somebody who knows the building is worth more than it sounds when a pipe fails on a Sunday.

What it costs is a payroll line, and payroll is the least compressible expense an association has. It generally rises with wages rather than with inflation in materials, it does not defer the way maintenance can, and it is the main reason a staffed building's assessment is higher than an unstaffed one's.

That makes assessment comparison across buildings genuinely misleading unless you establish what each one covers. A staffed building with heating included in the fee and an unstaffed building with neither are not comparable numbers, and quoting them side by side is one of the more common ways downtown condominiums get misjudged.

So the honest comparison is total monthly cost including everything, and the honest question is what the fee buys.

Secure entry is the related feature and is worth assessing rather than assuming: whether the entry is staffed continuously or only in parts of the day, what the arrangements are for deliveries and visitors, and how the building handles access for contractors an owner engages.

Balconies are structure as well as amenity

Balconies are named here, and in a multi-story building they are among the most demanding elements the association owns.

A balcony is exposed on every side, which makes it the part of a building that weathers hardest. Its structure, its waterproofing, its railings and its drainage all have finite lives, and repair generally means access equipment and work sequenced across many units at once. In most master deeds a balcony is a limited common element — assigned to the sole use of a unit, but maintained by the association — which means the owner enjoys it and the association pays for it, funded by everybody.

So the questions are what the master deed says a balcony is, when the balconies were last inspected and repaired, and whether the reserve study names them as their own line. Balcony repair programs are a recognized category of large special assessment in older residential towers, and a building that has done the work recently is in a much better position than one that has not.

For an owner the practical rules follow from the ownership: what may be placed, fixed, planted or screened on a balcony is set by the bylaws, and alterations touching the structure or the exterior appearance generally require approval.

Balconies also affect the unit itself. They shade the glazing below them, they change how weather reaches a facade, and on high floors they are considerably windier than people expect.

Combined units, and why the paperwork matters

In older buildings, adjacent units are sometimes combined into one larger home — two units knocked through, or several at the top made into a single floor. It is a common and often excellent thing to have done, and it raises a question people rarely ask.

A Michigan condominium's units are defined by the master deed and shown on its exhibit drawings. Combining two units changes what those documents describe, and doing it properly requires an amendment to the master deed, recorded with the county, reflecting the new unit and reallocating the percentage of value.

Where that was done, everything is clean: the recorded description matches the physical reality, one assessment applies, and title passes without difficulty.

Where it was not — and it frequently was not, particularly with older combinations — the building still legally contains two units that physically are one. That can mean two assessments, two votes, a legal description that does not match what a buyer walks through, and a title or lending complication that surfaces late in a transaction when somebody finally reads the documents carefully.

So on any combined unit the questions are: was the combination approved by the association, was the master deed amended, and is the amendment recorded?

The same logic applies to any alteration touching common elements — moving a wall that is structural, altering a balcony, changing a window. The bylaws set what requires approval, and unapproved work becomes the new owner's problem.

Living in downtown Ann Arbor, in practical terms

Downtown is the reason to be here, and the everyday realities are worth setting out plainly rather than discovering.

Parking is the first and largest. What comes with a unit — a deeded space, an assigned space, a right to rent one, or nothing — is a genuine component of value downtown, and the difference between a unit with deeded parking and one without is substantial and permanent. Establish whether a space is deeded, assigned or merely available, whether it can be sold or leased separately, and what the monthly cost is if it is not included. Where there is no space, find out what the alternatives actually cost and whether they are secured or waiting-list.

Noise is the second. A downtown with restaurants, bars, music venues and a university generates evening and weekend activity, and how much reaches a particular unit depends on floor, orientation, glazing and what is below and beside it. This is the single most variable thing between two units in the same building, and the only reliable test is to be there on a Friday evening with the windows shut and then open.

The university is the third, and it works in several directions at once. It underpins the local economy and the demand for downtown housing in a way few employers could. It also produces a large seasonal population, football Saturdays that transform this part of the city seven or eight times a year, and a rental market that shapes what buildings do about leasing.

Then the ordinary conveniences that are the point: everything within walking distance, no car needed for most errands, and a level of activity that some people want and others do not. Neither reaction is wrong, and both are better formed by spending an evening here than by reading about it.

And service and delivery access, refuse arrangements and moving logistics are all different in a downtown building than in a house — worth asking a resident about rather than assuming.

What a high-rise association actually owns, and has to fund

A high-rise is the most capital-intensive form of housing there is, and its association carries components no subdivision and few low-rise condominiums ever face. Understanding the list is most of what a buyer needs.

Elevators first. They are the single largest recurring capital item in most towers: a modernization — controllers, machine, cab, doors — is a very substantial sum per car, and it comes due on a cycle measured in decades rather than centuries. A building with original or long-unmodernized elevators has that expense ahead of it, and it is not optional, because an elevator that cannot be maintained takes the building out of use floor by floor.

The facade second. Whatever the exterior is — concrete, masonry, curtain wall, panel — it needs periodic inspection and repair, and in a tower that means access equipment, which is expensive before any work is done. Balconies are part of this and are frequently the most demanding part, because they are exposed on every side.

Central systems third. Many towers have a central boiler, chiller or both, serving every unit, rather than individual furnaces. That is convenient and it means the association owns and replaces very large plant — and it usually means heating or cooling is included in the assessment rather than metered per unit, so consumption is shared.

Then the roof, the fire protection and alarm systems, the common corridors and lobby, the security and entry systems, any parking structure, and the plumbing and electrical risers that serve every unit.

So the reserve study in a high-rise is not a formality — it is the document that determines whether an owner is buying a home or a series of special assessments. Ask for it, ask when the elevators were last modernized, when the facade was last surveyed and repaired, and what the central plant's age is. A building that has done that work and rebuilt its reserve is in a materially different position from one approaching it.

And ask about the history of special assessments. In a tower they are larger than most buyers expect, and a building's record of them is the most honest indicator of how it has been run.

What the association documents decide

Buying a condominium unit means buying into a corporation as well as a home, and the corporation's condition is not visible at a showing. Four documents settle it: the master deed and its exhibits, the bylaws, the current budget and the reserve study.

The master deed defines what the unit actually is — where the boundary runs between unit and common elements, and what limited common elements are assigned to its sole use. That is the most misunderstood part of condominium ownership, and it decides who pays for a great many things.

The bylaws set the rules that govern daily life: what may be altered, what may be parked, whether units may be leased and how many at once, and how the board is elected.

The budget and the reserve study together answer whether the association is solvent. An association with thin reserves and a large component near the end of its life is not cheaper — it is a deferred bill with an unknown date, and it arrives as a special assessment.

Board minutes are where a coming expense, a dispute or a construction defect claim surfaces first, and they are the most informative document nobody reads. I go through the recent ones as a matter of course.

One Michigan detail worth knowing: condominium documents are amended by recorded instrument, so what is recorded governs regardless of what any summary says.

Schools

Sloan Plaza is served by Ann Arbor Public Schools. District boundaries are redrawn from time to time.

Buying or selling here

The building's reserve position and what the assessment covers are the two things that decide this purchase.

For a seller, the reserve study, the balcony and facade history, and a clear statement of what the fee includes — staff, heating, water, parking — are what allow a buyer to compare this correctly against a cheaper fee elsewhere that buys much less. Naming genuine comparables for a large downtown unit is the other half, because a model will not find them.