The New York residential real estate market was on a tear throughout 2012, with an incredible crescendo during the summer. Then the storm hit, and overnight, the market quieted. So where did this force of nature leave the New York market?

As sales metrics improve month by month, economists seem to agree that residential real estate is awakening from its 36-month slumber. That being said, buyers and sellers are well advised to accept the uncertainties of the market and compromise.

esidential lending has become so cumbersome and unpredictable that a transaction without a financing component geometrically increases the likelihood that the parties will wind up at the closing table.

If there is one issue about owning a co-op or condo that will take center stage over the next few years, it will no doubt be carrying costs.

With the spring selling season around the corner, if March contract signings equal or exceed those in February, things could get pretty crazy around here. But let's look forward to a good crazy.

Notwithstanding the value of the co-op approval process, I can offer this unsolicited advice: it needs a re-write. It hungers for simplification, modernization and greater time efficiencies.

In a tragic turn of events last week, a troubled Upper West Side condo owner who said his building harassed him about his pitbull took his own life just hours after euthanizing his healthy five-year-old dog.

Rather than reverse a rejection, it's much more common for a board to ask for more information before rejecting, giving buyers a chance to allay anxieties or correct inaccurate or incomplete information.

Admit it: When you hear the real-estate maxim "location, location, location," you think about great neighborhoods and awesome transportation. That's fine -- unless you're looking for an apartment.

There's no hard data to suggest that 2012 won't be a better year for those of us in the real estate playground, as long as we accept the fact that the rules of the game will be constantly changing.

We have a saying in my industry that "buyers are liars." Buyers aren't actually lying to their brokers, it's just that sometimes we come to find out that our "must haves" are wants rather than needs.

My first place in Manhattan was a shared, seedy, shag-carpeted room in an SRO hotel that looked as if it had hosted many boozy lunchtime trysts. Eventually I moved into a grown-up apartment, for which I am exceedingly grateful.

At a time when the complexity of a basic residential real estate transaction has increased geometrically, could the presence of an attorney in the process actually be optional?

Thousands of residential co-op and condo loans close each day, but many of those loans have taken a great deal of time and effort to complete.

The grocery is called The Old Creamery because that's what the building was in the 1800s. Looking around The Old Creamery, one sees people here care about historical preservation, community, and sustainability.

It never ceases to amaze me how little first-time buyers know about purchasing a home. It's difficult for a beginner to digest all of the facets of a real estate transaction.

Free will can be significantly limited when living in a co-op or condo. The co-op or condo owner is required to submit to rules that are not expressly stated or come into existence after the purchase.

The process by which a bank completes the loan documentation at the closing is about as up to date as applying a wax seal. In the digitized world we live in today, a closing takes way too long.

Thanks to the Internet, the data available on a particular apartment has increased geometrically. But how does a purchaser process that information?

Here's an equation that would make any developer queasy: Lawyer purchasing a condo, plus alleged misrepresentation about the apartment's square footage = lawsuit.

An apartment or house purchase can be the largest financial transaction of your life, so it pays to have the best representation you can afford.