22-40 Chauncy St

Where 22-40 Chauncy St is

Its block in Downtown Boston, drawn from Boston's own building outlines and street centerlines.

The plan: window line, shape and floor rhythm

39 ft of exterior wall for each home the screen estimates — enough for two- and three-bedroom homes across the plan.

The typical floor has 763 ft of exterior wall, and across 10 residential floors the building carries 7,573 ft of it in total, divided among the 195 homes this screen estimates.

Its plate is moderately compact at 0.46: a squarish plan, with enough perimeter for a conventional double-loaded corridor. How window line and plate shape are measured.

At the model’s 750 sq ft average, the plan works out at about 19.5 homes per floor, repeated on every residential floor, since this building's outline does not change as it rises.

Why 22-40 Chauncy St scores 88 out of 100

Daylight efficiency 92, Interior depth 69, Scale 100, Finance 100 — each out of 100, then weighted.

Most of what it earns comes from daylight efficiency, and what holds it back most is interior depth, at 69 out of 100: deepest interior point 52 ft from a facade, scored from 80 ft down to 40 ft.

Built in 1899

Boston records this building as going up in 1899, which puts it in the pre-1920 stock.

As a rule, the era that converts most readily: load-bearing masonry, small floor plates laid out before deep-plan offices were possible, operable windows and generous floor-to-floor heights. The usual obstacles are not daylight but hazardous materials, lifts and bringing structure up to current code. That is the era’s general tendency rather than a finding about this building — the model reads an outline and a height, and can see nothing inside — but it is the first thing an architect would want to know, and it colours how much confidence the 86% daylight figure above deserves.

What the conversion would cost

$360 per square foot all-in across 213,376 sq ft of converted floor, or $76.8M in total — about $394K for each of the 195 homes.

That cost is charged across every converted square foot, including the 30,292 sq ft of windowless core, which has to be gutted, re-plumbed and sprinklered like the rest of the building and then earns nothing. Against it the model sets a completed value of $442K a home, which for 195 homes is $86.1M.

What would have to be true

This one already clears the bar. The question is how much room it has before it stops.

At $442K a home, completed value covers the $76.8M of work with $9.3M to spare. Value per home would have to fall to $394K — 11% below the assumption — before the conversion stopped penciling, or all-in cost would have to rise from $360 to $403 per square foot. Neither is a wide margin in a market that moves, but this building does not need a grant to work.

Each of these, moved on its own, would be enough to undo that for 22-40 Chauncy St:

All four are sliders in the survey, where 22-40 Chauncy St re-scores against your own numbers.

How it compares in Downtown Boston

22-40 Chauncy St ranks 50th of the 96 buildings screened here, against a median score of 89.

Its floor plate is better lit than 47% of them, and shallower than 44% of them at its deepest interior point. On size it is the 45th largest by estimated homes. The full survey of all 96 buildings ranks and maps every one of them, and the list by address links each to its own page.

Within the SKY zone

24th of 52 zoned SKY — the comparison that shares its rules, rents and streets.

52 of the screened buildings are zoned SKY. 22-40 Chauncy St ranks 24th of them against a median score of 88. 40 score 70 or more, their median deepest interior point is 51 ft from a facade against this building’s 52 ft, and together they would hold an estimated 19,019 homes. The group’s top scorer is 147 Milk St, at 100.

Its nearest match in size: 255 State St

The screened building closest to 22-40 Chauncy St in converted floor area is 255 State St: 206,638 sq ft over 11 stories, against 213,376 sq ft over 11 here.

22-40 Chauncy St scores 88 to its 68, and with the size held roughly equal most of that lead comes from daylight efficiency: 92 out of 100 here, 68 there (74% of the floor area within 35 ft of a facade, scored from 40% up to 90%). On the money they part ways: 255 State St pencils only with the modeled RESIDE grant, while 22-40 Chauncy St pencils without a subsidy. The two stand about 3,100 ft apart.

Would it qualify for a RESIDE Act grant?

The model awards 22-40 Chauncy St $10.0M, on the assumption it qualifies. Whether it does, no published dataset can say.

That figure assumes the building meets the Act’s vacant-and-abandoned test, which turns on code-enforcement and receivership records no city publishes.

It does not sit in a 2018 designated Opportunity Zone, so it would not draw that Section 201 priority.

Other buildings screened near 22-40 Chauncy St

The 4 closest the screen also covers, from 290 ft away. They are the colored outlines on the plan at the top of this page.

• 16-18 Kingston St
  22 stories · 88% daylit · 313 estimated homes · scores 93/100 (Strong candidate)
  about 290 ft away
• 1 Avenue De Lafayette
  22 stories · 59% daylit · 721 estimated homes · scores 35/100 (Marginal)
  about 340 ft away
• 83-87 Summer St
  6 stories · 90% daylit · 92 estimated homes · scores 89/100 (Strong candidate)
  about 350 ft away
• 21-53 Summer St
  11 stories · 47% daylit · 401 estimated homes · scores 27/100 (Unlikely)
  about 360 ft away