Downtown Manhattan for Under $600 per sq foot?

We found ourselves pondering the sub-$600 per sq foot price chopper question when we noticed yesterday that a couple of Battery Park one BRs have quietly drifted down to this attractive price range in the past couple of weeks. So what can we get for less than $600 per sq ft in our typical neighborhood (real estate) haunts? Not much, it turns out. Although a StreetEasy search returned 56 downtown (south of 14th Street) properties priced at $600 per sq foot or less, a full 39 of those (or almost 70%) were located in the traditionally cheaper, older and grittier Lower East Side, with most units located in the Co-op Village complex of Soviet-era apartments .

What about the other 17 listings? In most neighborhoods (including Tribeca, which has 5 listings for under $600 per sq foot), these cheap-o units are either full-building residential development opportunities (creepy horror houses that you can convert to condos), flat out commercial units or mixed use (fulfill your dreams of selling handmade jewelry and Statue of Liberty tiaras right out of your apartment). There are however, a handful of legitimate residential units for under $600 per sq ft. Here are some highlights:

Financial District: We were quite surprised to discover that much maligned (but currently In Contract) 55 Liberty St., #PH, the attic-like 3rd floor walk-up penthouse that we visited twice in the spring is the only unit in FiDi that's listed for less than $600 per sq ft ($599 to be exact).

Battery Park City: Battery Park is home to three pretty cute 1 BRs, all listed for less than $600 per sq ft. Of course the maintenance on these places is enough to make you pee in your pants take pause. We were surprised that the 2BRs in BPC were not yet in the $600 per sq ft range, since the higher priced market is worse and the common charges in many BPC buildings are allocated at a higher percentage for 2BRs.

East Village: Nada. Nothin' doin' in the East Village in this price range (except for three pseudo-commercial units). Were we surprised? Well, actually yeah. StreetEasy.com considers Alphabet City don't you have anything better to do than sit outside on your plastic chair and comment on my sweater? as part of the East Village and we were certainly thinking that some of those units around Avenue D would be cheap as sh*t priced to reflect the current market.