Jeanne C. Matase

A wide range of developers, owners, buyers, sellers, landlords, and tenants in the New York City area rely on Jeanne’s experienced counsel. She regularly represents condominium and cooperative sponsors, unit owners, shareholders, cooperative boards of directors, and condominium boards of managers.

Jeanne advocates before the New York State Department of Law on behalf of sponsors of cooperative and condominium offering plans that encompass new construction, gut rehabilitation, and conversions. She also obtains no-action letters.

As counsel to multiple cooperative housing board of directors and condominium board of managers, Jeanne assists with a wide variety of matters, including:

• Negotiating economic and construction disputes with sponsors
• Reviewing and interpreting governing documents
• Negotiating intra-building disputes
• Drafting amendments to proprietary leases, condominium declarations, and bylaws
• Enforcing unit owner and shareholder obligations
• Refinancing cooperative underlying mortgages
• Preparing service agreements and capital improvement contracts
• Conversion and sale of common elements to become part of a unit

In addition, Jeanne represents individual unit owners in disputes with condominium board of managers and shareholders in disputes with cooperative housing corporation board of directors. She also advocates to ensure sponsor obligations to the unit owners and shareholders are enforced.

For more than 25 years, Jeanne has worked with owners of commercial, mixed-use, and multifamily projects in all development phases. Jeanne advocates on their behalf before government and quasi-government agencies including the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development, the New York City Housing Development Corp., and the New York City Partnership Housing Development Fund Company Inc.

Jeanne also represents developers before New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development in the preparation of applications under Sections 421(a), 421(g), and 11-243 (formerly known as Section J-51) of the New York State Real Property Law. She is involved in the preparation and negotiation of lower income housing plans pursuant to Section 23-90 of the New York City Zoning Resolution. In addition, to maximize tax-incentive benefits for owners of mixed-use buildings, Jeanne prepares condominium structures so that they qualify for two or more New York City real estate tax benefit programs.

Dedicated to Finding Creative Solutions

Jeanne devises innovative strategies that help propel her clients’ real estate deals. When representing developers in transactions with religious institutions, she negotiated agreements where, in exchange for the transfer of the real property to the developer, the religious institutions received a finished condominium unit upon the development’s completion. Providing counsel to the seller of another property, Jeanne’s ability to secure valuable development rights for her client resulted in a much higher selling price.