When Developers Convert Churches Into Condos

Even outside of sermons, Terry Starks often falls into the rolling cadences and exhortations of the pastor he has been for the past two decades, a declamatory tone that makes it easy to believe him when he says that God gave him the right to a 113-year-old, 48,000-square-foot church on New York City’s Upper West Side. Developers have been struggling to convert this building, initially called the First Church of Christ Scientist New York and then 1 West 96th Street, but now referred to in documents as 361 Central Park West, into luxury apartments since its sale in June 2014 for $26 million. But Starks knows a higher power is on his side, even in the secular arena of Manhattan real estate. "361 is a promise God made me. That building means to me what Israel means to the Jews," he says. "How are you going to turn God’s house into condos?"

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