By Caryl Berenato — Licensed Associate Real Estate Broker, Compass | REALM Global Member | Certified Senior Advisor
Before anything is listed, one question has to be answered: who has the legal authority to sell. If your parent has capacity, the apartment is theirs to sell and they sign. If they do not, authority rests with whoever holds a durable power of attorney, or with a trustee if the apartment sits in a trust, or with a court-appointed guardian if neither exists. If your parent has died, it is an estate sale and the executor signs once letters are issued. Families routinely spend weeks preparing a listing before discovering that the person organising it cannot actually sign the contract. Establish that first, with an attorney, and the rest of the process becomes manageable.
Who Actually Has Authority to Sign?
This is a legal question and your attorney answers it, but knowing the four common situations helps you ask the right one.
Situation | Who signs | What to confirm early |
|---|---|---|
Parent has capacity | The parent | That they are leading the decision, not being led through it |
Durable power of attorney | The agent named in it | That the document is durable, current, and expressly covers real property |
Apartment held in trust | The trustee | Whether the trust permits sale and who the successor trustee is |
Parent has died | The executor or administrator | That letters have been issued — timing here often sets the whole schedule |
Two things reliably cause delay. The first is a power of attorney that exists but does not clearly extend to real property, or is old enough that a co-op board or title company questions it. The second is an estate where letters have not yet been issued, which can hold up a closing well after a buyer is ready.
Neither is a reason to postpone talking to a broker. Both are reasons to talk to an attorney at the same time.
What Changes When It Is a Co-op?
A good deal, and it is worth understanding before you price the apartment.
The board still approves the purchaser. Your parent's circumstances do not exempt the buyer from the usual financial disclosure, and a board can decline a purchaser for reasons it does not have to explain. That means buyer quality matters more than in a condo sale — the highest offer is not the best offer if the purchaser will not pass. I have written a fuller account of what a co-op board package involves.
Estate sales carry extra paperwork. Boards typically want the letters testamentary, the death certificate, and documentation of the estate's authority to convey, on top of everything they normally request. Assembling that in advance shortens the gap between accepted offer and closing.
Some buildings have their own requirements for estate transfers — a flip tax treatment, a required attorney review, occasionally a right of first refusal. The managing agent will tell you if you ask early.
Maintenance keeps running. Every month between the move and the closing costs the family the monthly maintenance whether or not anyone is living there. That is usually the strongest practical argument against an overpriced first ask.
Should We Empty the Apartment Before Listing?
Usually partly, rarely completely, and almost never on the schedule families first imagine.
A fully furnished apartment that has been lived in for forty years photographs poorly and shows worse. Buyers struggle to see past dense furniture, heavy window treatments and decades of accumulated possessions. Some editing is genuinely worth doing.
But a completely emptied prewar apartment can read as cold, and rooms with unusual proportions — which describes much of prewar Manhattan — are often harder to understand empty than lightly furnished. The middle path is generally right: clear the volume, keep enough to give scale, and address the two or three cosmetic items that draw the eye.
The part families underestimate is time. Sorting a parent's possessions is emotionally slow, and it involves siblings who are rarely in the same city or in the same frame of mind. It routinely takes longer than the sale. Start it before you think you need to, and do not let the listing schedule dictate its pace — the reverse works better.
If there is anything of real value, have it appraised before it is distributed or discarded. That is a conversation to have once, early, rather than after something has gone.
How Fast Does This Need to Happen?
Faster than a normal sale, but the pressure is usually financial rather than a genuine deadline.
Assisted living is typically paid monthly and often funded from the proceeds of exactly this apartment. Meanwhile the apartment is still generating maintenance, insurance and utilities. The combination creates real urgency, and it is the reason estate and transition sales are more often mispriced than ordinary ones — families either price optimistically and carry the apartment for months, or price defensively and leave money behind.
The way through it is arithmetic rather than instinct. Establish the monthly cost of holding the apartment, establish a realistic range from comparable sales in the building and the immediate blocks, and decide what a month of waiting is worth. Sometimes the honest answer is that the apartment should be priced to move in weeks rather than months. Sometimes it is that a small amount of preparation adds more than the carrying cost. That decision should be made with numbers in front of you.
What About Taxes and Cost Basis?
This one belongs firmly with your accountant, and the answer differs materially depending on whether your parent is living.
The reason it matters here is that the tax treatment can differ substantially between a sale during a parent's lifetime and a sale by the estate afterwards. That difference is sometimes large enough to affect timing, and it is a poor thing to discover after a contract has been signed.
Raise it with a CPA before the apartment is listed, not after. I do not give tax advice, but I have seen enough transactions to say confidently that this is the question families most often ask too late.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I sell my parent's apartment if I have power of attorney?
If the power of attorney is durable, currently valid, and expressly authorizes real-property transactions, generally yes. Confirm the specific wording with an attorney before listing, because a co-op board, a title company or a buyer's counsel may scrutinize it, and a document that is unclear on real property can stall a closing. A power of attorney also ends at death, at which point authority passes to the executor.
What happens if my parent has died before the apartment sells?
The sale becomes an estate sale. Authority passes from any power of attorney to the executor or administrator, who cannot act until the Surrogate's Court issues letters. If the apartment is already under contract, expect the closing date to be delayed while that is completed. Work with the buyer's side and manage expectations early — an unexplained delay is often what loses deals, not the delay itself.
Do co-op boards treat estate sales differently?
The board's review of the purchaser is the same, but the paperwork on the seller's side is heavier: letters testamentary, the death certificate and documentation of authority to convey are typically required alongside the usual package. Some buildings also have specific provisions for estate transfers. Ask the managing agent what the building requires before you accept an offer.
Should the apartment be renovated before selling?
Rarely a full renovation. The money and months are seldom recovered, and a buyer will often want to make their own renovation decisions regardless. Targeted cosmetic work — paint, floor refinishing, lighting, addressing anything that reads as deferred maintenance — usually returns more per dollar than a kitchen. Judge it against the monthly carrying cost, because a renovation that takes four months has four months of maintenance attached.
How long does it take to sell a Manhattan apartment in this situation?
It varies by price point, building and how the apartment shows, and it is longer than most families expect once board approval is included. The board process alone adds meaningful time after a contract is signed. Plan the schedule around accepted-offer-to-closing rather than listing-to-offer, since that is where the surprises usually are.
What do we do with the furniture and belongings?
Sort before listing, but do not empty entirely. Appraise anything potentially valuable before it is distributed or discarded. Estate-sale companies, auction houses and donation services all handle the remainder, and the right choice depends on what is there. Give this more time than the sale itself — it is the part that consistently runs long.
When should we contact a broker?
Earlier than most families do — ideally while the move is being planned rather than after it has happened. Sequencing, pricing, whether to empty first and how the timing interacts with care costs are all easier to decide before anything is committed. An early conversation costs nothing and usually changes at least one decision.
If your family is working through this, I am glad to talk before anything is decided. I have helped dozens of families through transitions like it over four decades in Manhattan, and the early conversation is usually the useful one. Reach me at caryl.berenato@compass.com or (917) 804-7367, or through the contact page.
Related: Selling an Inherited Manhattan Property · What Is a Certified Senior Advisor in Real Estate? · The NYC Co-op Board Package Checklist