At Garth Woods Owners Corp., 235 Garth Road, a new shareholder can wait seven to eight years for a garage or outdoor parking space. The building's management-supplied Domecile page says so. Garage parking runs $151 a month and an outdoor space $97 once your name comes up. Storage has a waitlist too, at $45 a month. None of this shows up in a list price. Much of it surfaces only after a buyer has an accepted offer and is working through the board package.
Garth Road keeps a lot of its most important numbers in places like that. The buildings along this half-mile stretch were all built in the same era and sit by the same train station. The biggest difference between them is the rulebook each co-op board publishes. Those rules decide how much cash a buyer needs, how much income they need, and who they can sell to later. Two apartments a few doors apart can sell to very different groups of buyers.
One enclave, thirteen buildings
The mailing address says Scarsdale 10583, but the Garth Road neighborhood is in unincorporated Eastchester. The Scarsdale Historical Society's Garth Road history, dated December 2025, describes about thirty acres with thirteen mid-rise multifamily buildings built between 1926 and 1966. There are no single-family houses. A small commercial strip sits at the north end, a public park at the south end, and the Bronx River Reservation along the west side. The Scarsdale Metro-North station is just to the north, and the monograph calls it the second busiest station on the Harlem Line. Scarsdale10583's February 2026 history of the street also describes it as Eastchester's 30-acre enclave, developed in the late 1920s just south of the station.
So the location, the commute and the prewar architecture are close to the same for every building on the street. When two similar apartments here behave differently on the market, the cause usually starts with each corporation's posted purchase criteria.
The financing cap sets your cash floor
Here is what seven of the buildings publish, either through their management pages or their purchase applications. The Domecile pages for Garth Woods, Cragswold and Scarsdale Manor are public. The other four buildings' criteria come from purchase applications distributed by their managing agent, and each building's agent can provide the current version. Some criteria are labeled "preferred" or "recommended" rather than firm rules, and the forms carry different dates, so the table includes the date and the label for each one.
| Building | Address | Max financing | Debt-to-income guideline | Subletting | Date on page or form |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Garth Woods Owners Corp. | 235 Garth Road | 80% | 28%, plus 33% including mortgage, maintenance and other debts | Not allowed | Page dated 10/21/26 |
| Cragswold, Inc. | 187 Garth Road | 50% | 35%, recommended | Not allowed | House rules dated 1/23/2025 |
| Scarsdale Manor Owners, Inc. | 174–198 Garth Road | 80% | Not posted | Not posted; pied-à-terre allowed | Page dated 10/21/26 |
| Colchester Owners Inc. | 143 Garth Road | 80%, preferred | 36%, preferred | Shareholder occupancy only | Application rev. 9/2025 |
| 281 Scarsdale Corp. | 281 Garth Road | 80% | Below 35% | Board approval after two years of occupancy | Application rev. 8/2023 |
| Thornycroft Tenants Corp. | 209 Garth Road | 80% | 35% or less | Not posted | Application from late 2025 |
| 105 Northgate Tenants Corp. | 105 Garth Road | 10% minimum down, preferred | Less than 35%, preferred | After two years of residency | Rules updated 2025 |
The 50% cap at Cragswold is the number that changes the most. Cragswold's Domecile page lists maximum financing at half the purchase price. Run the arithmetic on a hypothetical $300,000 apartment. At Cragswold the buyer needs at least $150,000 in cash before closing costs. At an 80% building down the street, the same price requires $60,000. That is a $90,000 difference at the same price, on the same street.
The financing cap decides which buyers can make an offer at all. A building that requires half down is selling only to people with large amounts of cash, and the price an apartment can reach depends on how many of those people are looking that month.
Cash requirements don't end at closing. Boards also ask for money left in the bank afterward. Cragswold recommends liquid assets equal to nine months of maintenance. The 281 Scarsdale Corp. application asks for six months of maintenance and mortgage payments after closing. Northgate's guide asks for twelve.
Two ratios at Garth Woods, and why the lower one matters
Most of the buildings in the table post one debt-to-income figure, set at or just under 35%, with Colchester's preferred figure at 36%. Garth Woods posts two. The first is a 28% maximum. The second is 33%, and it counts the monthly mortgage, maintenance and other monthly debts together.
A household with student loans or a car payment can pass a 35% test at Thornycroft or 281 and still fall short at Garth Woods. Its 80% financing cap is the same as its neighbors'. The income test is where it screens buyers more tightly. Two buyers pre-approved for the same loan amount can get different answers from boards a few hundred feet apart.
Who can buy, and who you can sell to later
Financing and income rules decide who can buy your apartment today. Occupancy rules decide who can buy it from you later.
Garth Woods doesn't allow subletting, guarantors, pied-à-terre use or secondary residences. It also doesn't allow parents to buy for an employed child or a student child. It does allow co-purchasing. Cragswold also doesn't allow subletting.
Scarsdale Manor's page lists guarantors as allowed, subject to the board's decision, and pied-à-terre use as allowed. Secondary residences are not. Northgate and 281 allow subletting after two years, and at 281 it needs board approval.
Every rule like this removes a group of possible buyers. A buyer who needs a parent as guarantor can be considered at Scarsdale Manor but not at Garth Woods. An owner who might take a job elsewhere for a year has an option at Northgate that doesn't exist at Cragswold. When you buy into one of these buildings, you are also choosing who will be eligible to buy from you.
The costs that arrive after the accepted offer
Garth Woods publishes its fee schedule in full, which makes it a useful example of what a Garth Road closing can include.
- Buyer pays at submission: a $250 administrative fee, an application processing fee of $500 for one applicant or $550 for two, a $250 financing fee if the purchase is financed, and a $250 move-in fee.
- Buyer pays at closing: a $150 recognition agreement fee if financing, $200 overtime if a lender closing runs past two hours, and $200 travel if the lender requires a closing outside Westchester County.
- Seller pays at closing: a flip tax of $7.50 per share and a $700 transfer agent closing fee.
Other buildings structure their charges differently. Scarsdale Manor lists a refundable $700 carpet deposit, a $100 credit-check fee per applicant, a $250 mortgage-financing fee if applicable, and refundable $500 move-in and move-out deposits. Colchester's application lists a $400 nonrefundable administrative fee.
Then there is the tax line. Both Garth Woods and Scarsdale Manor post a notice that STAR credits shown on the seller's monthly co-op bill do not carry over to a new owner. Those credits expire, and a new shareholder has to apply directly to New York State through the state's STAR program page. So the monthly charge a seller shows you may already include a credit you won't receive. This post is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Confirm eligibility, ratios and fees for your own situation with your attorney, accountant or lender and with the building's managing agent.
What the county numbers can and can't tell you
There is no published sales series just for Garth Road. The closest current data is countywide. Per the OneKey MLS September 2026 Westchester County report, Westchester co-ops closed 140 sales in September 2026 at a median of $242,500. That median was up 1.0% from a year earlier. Median days on market was 60. New listings fell 32.9% to 141, while inventory rose 7.1% to 498. For the full third quarter of 2026, the Q3 county report shows a $250,000 median, up 6.4%. Pending sales rose 11.5% to 435, and supply stood at 3.7 months.
Countywide, co-op apartments in fall 2026 took about two months to sell, and pending deals were rising even as fewer new units came on the market. On Garth Road, the county median says little about one specific listing. That apartment's sale time depends on how many shoppers can clear its own building's financing cap, income ratio and occupancy rules.
Short FAQ
Is Garth Road part of the Village of Scarsdale? No. The enclave is in unincorporated Eastchester, even though it uses a Scarsdale 10583 mailing address and the Scarsdale Metro-North station sits just to the north.
Are the posted criteria fixed rules? Not always. Colchester labels its figures "preferred" and Cragswold labels its ratio "recommended." The managing agent for several buildings warns that forms online may not be current. The 281 Scarsdale Corp. application still shows an August 2023 revision. Ask the managing agent for the current package before you make an offer.
Who pays the flip tax? At Garth Woods, the selling shareholder pays $7.50 per share at closing. Scarsdale Country Estates, a nearby co-op off Central Avenue rather than on Garth Road, charges its sellers $10 per share.
If you're weighing a Garth Road co-op, or getting one ready to sell, Daniel McKeon can pull the current board package and walk you through the building's financing, income and sublet rules before you set a price or make an offer. Schedule a consultation and start with the building's actual rules.
