Inwood Has A $3 Million Rock For Sale, Report Says

INWOOD, NY — A massive rock dating back 500 million years sitting on an empty lot in Inwood is on the market for $3 million — or at least half of it is, according to a report.

The New York Times has detailed a peculiar New York City real estate saga in which a 30,000-cubic-foot rock that has two owners has put the block's marble fixture — and a community garden — into question.

The 30-foot tall rock has sat untouched on Cooper Street at 207th Street — speaking to the neighborhood's history as a once rural country block, according to the Times.

But now — following the Inwood rezoning— Ilan Tavor, who owns half the rock, is selling his half for $3 million for development.

The beloved Cooper Street rock and a garden that neighbors have stewarded for more than a decade are now being eyed for development, to the dismay of some neighbors.

"When the Rock is gone, Inwood is lost," said one resident at a neighboring cooperative building, Paul Epstein.

Tavor has owned the lot since 2004, and since, neighbors have stewarded parts of the property into a community garden stretching to the other half of the rock, owned by a neighboring cooperative building where some gardeners live.

Around when Tavor put the lot on the market, signs saying "No Trespassing" were erected and plantings were ripped out from the garden on Tavor's side — letting the property become overgrown and neglected. The Times speculates Tavor "does not want a so-called adverse possession claim from the co-op: under state law, when someone inhabits and improves a neglected property, it might be possible to get the title to it after 10 years."

But another oddity: the portion of the rock the co-op does own isn't even adjacent to its own building — meaning any construction on the rock lot that Tavor is selling would abut the co-op's building, the newspaper wrote.

Click here to read the full New York Times report.

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There really is a giant rock on Cooper Street. #thisisinwood
A post shared by Cooper Street Rock (@cooperstreetrock) on Jul 26, 2019 at 8:35pm PDT