The New School plans to sell the president’s West Village townhouse, otherwise known as the Scatturo House, in an attempt to remedy the university’s current $52 million budget deficit.
The property is estimated to be worth between $9.5 million and $12.26 million in 2024.
Mark Diaz, an interim executive of the university’s Business and Operations department, announced the plans at a faculty budget presentation last Tuesday. Without intervention, The New School is estimated to lose over $200 million in a 3-5 year span, according to Diaz.
“We have identified, for a number of reasons, that the Scatturo House does not fit the primary objective of the presidential residence,” Diaz said.
Diaz stated that the “process is underway,” and that the sale has a potential to realize $12 to $15 million for the university. It has not yet been listed.
The property is estimated to sell for $9.5 million, according to real-estate agent Sammy Noiman, who is affiliated with the brokerage company Compass. But, according to Redfin, the property could be worth between $10.30 million and $12.26 million.
“The sale will result in an anticipated reduction in net annual costs and is consistent with our strategic plans for the university to focus resources on our educational mission and best serve our students,” the university told The New School Free Press in an official statement.
Purchased in 1984 for $990,000 by The New School for Social Research, the property’s primary purpose has been to provide free housing for university presidents.
The four-story brownstone has been a source of controversy in recent years, attracting attention during the 25-day adjunct faculty strike in 2022. That fall, dozens of New School students and faculty protested outside of the townhouse, where former university president Dwight McBride resided at the time.
In a list of occupation demands, protestors demanded that “the President’s townhouse be treated as a communal property of The New School and used for purposes determined by the non-administrative TNS community.”
Two years earlier, Professor and Chair of Economics at TNS Sanjay Reddy proposed selling the townhouse as an alternative cost-cutting measure to the university laying off 122 employees during the Covid-19 pandemic.
“The sale of the President’s house … could, according to recent estimates, generate almost the amount of money expected to be saved in both FY21 and FY22 from the layoffs (and around three times the amount expected to be saved by them in the current fiscal year),” he said in his response to the university’s budget cuts.
The sale of the townhouse could account for between 18% and 24% of the university’s $52 million budget deficit, based on real estate estimates. Diaz predicts that this, along with the rest of TNS’s financial remedy plan, will result in a $350 million improvement.
Additional reporting by Theo Lim-Jisra
TNS has a difficult business model trying to educate students in a city where costs are 3x a comparable suburban location. The school is such an asset to nyc and the world. I worry that it may be the next Black Mountain College. God Bless the Board for trying to make the school viable.
I’m interested in the below quote. How is paying exorbitant rent for the next president gonna be cheaper than already owning a residence and event space? It would seem like common sense that those costs would be much greater going forward. Which administrator is this quote attributed to?
“The sale will result in an anticipated reduction in net annual costs,”