The Story
In 1898, Jeremiah J. Gilligan put up eight four-story flats buildings on Carroll Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, acting as his own architect, developer, and builder from an office at 188 Park Place. The row, 703 through 719, cost him $80,000 all in, and it remains one of Park Slope's better arguments for the small apartment house: Renaissance Revival fronts whose rounded bays undulate down the blockfront, bookended by St. Francis Xavier Church at the Sixth Avenue corner and Old First Reformed at Seventh. Gilligan gave each house eight flats across four stories, and 707 still holds exactly that count, an eight-unit walk-up that later reorganized as a condominium. City tax records date the building to 1920, but the construction record says otherwise, and the record wins.
The Home
Unit 4R is the building's sponsor unit, offered as a complete gut renovation, and the listing is refreshingly plain about it. The 798 square feet on the top floor come with the plan, kitchen, bath, and finishes left entirely to the next owner, while the bones worth keeping are already in place: decorative moldings and original built-ins from the Gilligan era, waiting on restoration rather than invention. The real headline sits upstairs. The unit carries 891 square feet of dedicated roof space with Manhattan skyline views, more outdoor area than apartment below it. Showings are by appointment, and the seller's own instruction is the honest one: bring your architect, your contractor, and your vision.
