Condo Conversion Pencil Test
Compare two exits for the same Los Angeles building: sell it whole as apartments, or convert and sell the units individually. Several statutory costs are calculated from current published rules. Everything that depends on your property, tenancy, or professional advice is owner-entered or shown as unestimated.
This is preliminary brokerage analysis, not advice. It is not legal, tax, engineering, lending, DRE, appraisal, or investment advice, and it does not tell you whether to convert. It shows both scenarios and the gap between them so you can decide what deserves a real feasibility study. Conversion outcomes turn on facts this page cannot see, including your tenancies, building condition, and the approvals your specific property would need. New to the subject? Start with our guide to converting an apartment building to condos or, if your building may already be mapped, our condo-mapped building guide.
Your building
Start with what you know. The starting numbers are generic examples, not market data; every field is yours.
Drives tenant costs and timeline.
Finished, individually sold. Comparable condo resales, not apartment per-unit pricing.
Brokerage, escrow, and title on a bulk sale, excluding transfer taxes, which are calculated. Negotiated; enter your own figure so the two scenarios compare fairly.
Financing, taxes, and timeline
Carry is usually the cost owners underestimate most, and rent collected during the project offsets it.
From your tax bill, not a rate on market value; long-held buildings often carry a far lower assessed value. Renovation can trigger supplemental assessments.
Rent minus operating costs while you still collect it. It declines as units vacate and sell; enter your honest average.
Professional costs
These carry published ranges from our transaction planning at roughly 20-unit scale, shown as midpoints you can change. They are project-level costs and do not scale linearly with unit count.
Published range $20,000 to $40,000 as a project total.
LAAA 20-unit planning reference: $30,000 to $50,000 as a project total. Not an independent vendor quote or a market benchmark.
$8,000 to $13,000 boutique; $50,000+ at large firms.
PERS plus FHA, roughly $20,000 to $30,000 per project. VA is separate.
Costs only you can estimate
We do not publish defaults for these because no defensible public figure exists for your building. Leave one blank and it stays out of the math, and the summary tells you it was not estimated.
To retail condo condition.
Project total.
Get a plumbing audit first. A master meter can materially complicate a sell-off; a specialist determines whether submetering or an HOA allocation structure works for your project and its lenders.
Current LA no-fault schedule runs $11,000 to $27,400 per household. Which schedule governs your building is a question for counsel.
Escrow, title, and recording on each unit sale, excluding transfer taxes, which are calculated.
Two scenarios
Preliminary brokerage math from your inputs. It does not tell you which path to take, and neither scenario models your final income tax.
Sell as apartments
$4,972,000
After $28,000 in estimated transfer taxes; costs of sale not estimated
Convert and sell off
$8,053,387
From $9,000,000 gross
Modeled difference
+$3,081,387
over roughly 42 additional months, before the categories below that you have not estimated
Share of the modeled cost categories with a calculated, sourced, or owner-entered value. Blank categories lower this number; they never silently improve the comparison.
Not estimated yet
unit renovation, common-area work, water submetering, tenant relocation and buyouts, escrow and title per closing, resale brokerage, insurance carry, association startup and reserves, property tax carry, operating income during the hold, costs of sale on the bulk scenario, contingency. Real numbers here can move the comparison materially.
| DRE filing feecalculated | $3,300 |
| City 9A reportscalculated | $1,417 |
| City conversion application (base fee)calculated | $18,067 |
| Relocation assistance plan feecalculated | $3,089 |
| LAHD conversion feecalculated | $29,840 |
| Estimated documentary transfer tax on unit salescalculated | $50,400 |
| Measure ULA on unit salescalculated | $0 |
| Interest carrycalculated | $735,000 |
| Property tax carryyour input | not estimated |
| Professional costssourced range | $105,500 |
| Renovationyour input | not estimated |
| Tenant costsyour input | not estimated |
| Escrow and titleyour input | not estimated |
| Resale brokerageyour input | not estimated |
| Insurance carryyour input | not estimated |
| Contingencyyour input | not estimated |
| Total modeled costs | $946,613 |
Cash withheld at closings (not a cost)
$299,970
California withholds 3.333% of gross price at each closing (Form 593) unless an exemption or elective calculation applies. It is a prepayment credited against your final tax, so it affects cash timing during the sellout, not the net comparison above.
City conversion figures are base fees; City Planning surcharges are additional, so confirm totals in the Fee Estimator. Transfer tax lines assume the full sale price is taxable (no assumed liens survive the transfer). Whether a unit-by-unit sellout changes how your gain is taxed, and which relocation schedule governs your building, are questions for your CPA and landlord-tenant counsel.
Have us run the real numbersWe pull your recorded maps, parcel structure, and DRE file at no cost.
Where these numbers come from
Calculated figures use current published rules: the Measure ULA transfer tax thresholds in effect for closings after June 30, 2026 and reset each July 1, the base documentary transfer tax of $1.10 per $1,000 (LA County) plus $4.50 per $1,000 (LA City) on every closing, estimated assuming the full sale price is taxable, California Form 593 withholding at 3.333% of gross price per closing, the City of Los Angeles 9A report fee of $70.85 per unit transfer, the DRE common-interest filing fee of $3,000 plus $15 per unit interest, and for fresh conversions the City Planning conversion application base fee ($17,570 to $19,336 across four unit-count tiers per LAMC 19.02, Ordinance 188,796 effective February 23, 2026, adjusted annually), the $3,089 relocation assistance plan fee on occupied buildings, and the LAHD condominium conversion fee of $1,492 per unit paid before the final map records. City Planning surcharges, including the 10% general plan maintenance surcharge and the 3% development services center surcharge, apply on top of the base fees and are not computed here; the City Planning Fee Estimator carries the total. Professional cost ranges come from specialist planning on transactions at roughly 20-unit scale and are project-level totals that do not scale linearly with unit count. Renovation, submetering, tenant costs, insurance, and absorption carry no published default here because no defensible public figure exists for an arbitrary building, which is why they are your inputs. Questions? Call Glen Scher and Filip Niculete at (818) 212-2808.