{"id":375160,"date":"2026-10-16T21:33:52","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T21:33:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/375160\/"},"modified":"2026-10-16T21:33:52","modified_gmt":"2026-10-16T21:33:52","slug":"the-married-couple-living-in-two-separate-co-op-apartments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/375160\/","title":{"rendered":"The Married Couple Living in Two Separate Co-op Apartments"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n Sarah and Len in Len\u2019s apartment on the eighth floor, where they have lunch and dinner most days.
\n Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

On a typical morning, Sarah Crichton wakes up at 6:30 and heads out for a long walk, leaving her husband, Len Berman, snoozing in bed. When she returns from her stroll, she checks on Len in the bedroom before heading downstairs to her own apartment, where she makes coffee for two. A bit later, Len wanders down to her place for coffee and their morning round of cards.<\/p>\n

The couple, divorc\u00e9s in their 70s who met on OkCupid in January 2020, both maintain their own apartments in the same Brooklyn Heights co-op building. Len owns unit 8J; Sarah\u2019s place, unit 7G, is one flight down.<\/p>\n

When they first met six years ago, Sarah was living alone in her Boerum Hill brownstone; Len was subletting a place on the Upper West Side while his new Brooklyn Heights apartment was being renovated. The city went into full lockdown, and as their relationship progressed, Len moved in with Sarah so they could continue seeing each other. \u201cBut he clearly didn\u2019t feel at home,\u201d says Sarah. \u201cAlso, my ex-husband had lived there, and that was uncomfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n

It took two years to renovate Len\u2019s apartment, which he bought following the end of his 35-year marriage. When he finally moved into his new home in the spring of 2022, \u201che was so excited,\u201d says Sarah. \u201cHe was obsessed with his apartment.\u201d Len, a retired IBM research scientist, began spending the day at his own place, then staying there overnight. However, the couple missed each other, and Sarah began staying over at Len\u2019s more often. That fall, they got married and she started living at Len\u2019s nearly full time. While his one-bedroom was perhaps a quarter the size of Sarah\u2019s brownstone, \u201cwe were in love and happy, and it was like having a cute little aerie,\u201d says Sarah.<\/p>\n

But then it was Sarah\u2019s turn to feel uncomfortable. \u201cThis apartment reflects Len so powerfully. It\u2019s the apartment of somebody who intensely loves the things he loves and also never had an apartment of his own to express himself. But it doesn\u2019t reflect me,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

The first time she saw Len\u2019s home, she recalls, \u201cit was the apartment of a mathematician. It\u2019s all these geometric shapes, and the wall was a total reflection of his mind, which I found charming.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s got a lot of geometric stuff in it,\u201d Len agrees. \u201cIt\u2019s kind of an orderly sort of apartment. Except it\u2019s totally unorderly. And the more intensely mine it is, the messier it gets!\u201d<\/p>\n

On a recent evening, the couple offered a tour of Len\u2019s apartment. With its stark white walls and endless expanses of tile, industrial shelving, and storage units ordered from the Uline catalogue, it looks like a gallery crossed with a Costco warehouse. The rooms are hung with wire grid-wall panels typically used for retail displays. \u201cIt lets you move things around, in theory. Not that I\u2019ve ever moved anything,\u201d says Len.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n Len with the gridded wall system he installed in his apartment on the 8th floor.
\n Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n A closer view of Len\u2019s desk area and gridded wall organizer.
\n Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

Among the items on display: a Mad Hatter top hat; a series of small, cartoonish paintings; Christmas lights; a fly swatter; bungee cords; retractable tape measures; exercise bands; sunglasses; and a sack of dog biscuits. \u201cSometimes a dog will visit,\u201d says Len. \u201cAnd I like to be prepared.\u201d His furniture tends toward the ad hoc; his desk consists of a used slab of countertop laid over a pair of ancient filing cabinets. The restaurant cart alongside it displays a dust buster, an industrial mixer, and a bucket of vintage Altoids containers.<\/p>\n

Sarah\u2019s taste leans more traditional. She\u2019s a book editor who\u2019s drawn to warm colors, Central Asian patterned rugs, sleek cherrywood cabinets and mid-century-modern furniture \u2014 what she describes as \u201cclassic New York.\u201d And it\u2019s far less cluttered.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n Sarah in her apartment downstairs from Len\u2019s, where they do most of their entertaining.
\n Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

To give each other their own spaces, the couple first considered buying a two-bedroom apartment together or renting a studio that Sarah could use as an office. But about six months after they got married, Sarah was browsing StreetEasy and spotted an open house at noon for an apartment downstairs from Len\u2019s. \u201cWe hadn\u2019t really figured out what we wanted to do,\u201d recalls Sarah. \u201cAnd then we walked in, and I whispered to Len, \u2018I want this!\u2019 So we bought it that afternoon, basically.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because their co-op is entangled in an unpredictable land-lease situation, the units sell for about half the cost of what\u2019s typical for Brooklyn Heights. Buying and maintaining the two units costs less than they\u2019d be paying for a typical two-bedroom in the neighborhood, they say.<\/p>\n

For a couple who maintains separate homes, Sarah and Len spend a lot of time together. After their morning coffee and cards at Sarah\u2019s place, Len heads back upstairs to work on the sci-fi novel he\u2019s been writing while Sarah works in her bedroom downstairs, which she\u2019s converted into a home office. It has a fold-out sofa instead of a bed; the couple\u2019s overnight guests always stay in Sarah\u2019s apartment.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n Sarah in her office, which is the bedroom of her 7th floor apartment.
\n Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

Around noon, Sarah heads upstairs to Len\u2019s apartment, often for the rest of the day. She works on her laptop at the dining table while he works at his desk.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get lonely,\u201d says Sarah.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like her to be here,\u201d says Len. \u201cI mean, I\u2019m glad she can go, but I\u2019m glad when she\u2019s here. If she was downstairs and didn\u2019t come up here to make lunch, I\u2019d probably come down.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since they typically eat lunch and dinner together at Len\u2019s, that\u2019s where they keep the everyday food \u2014 they stash the overflow in Sarah\u2019s kitchen. And because Sarah\u2019s more formal place has the long dining-room table and all the big pots and roasting pans, they use her place for entertaining, including last fall\u2019s Thanksgiving dinner for 16. But it\u2019s impossible to plan everything perfectly. \u201cWe do wander up and down with pots of food and stuff like that because we have different equipment,\u201d says Sarah. \u201cI finally got a Cuisinart in Len\u2019s apartment because I just can\u2019t live without a food processor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following dinner and another game of cards, Sarah likes to read and watch TV in Len\u2019s bedroom before conking out early (they always sleep in Len\u2019s bedroom). Len stays up late working at his desk. \u201cI don\u2019t like to watch TV, period,\u2019 says Len. \u201cAnd in bed? I\u2019m just not going to do it.\u201d If they watch a movie together, it\u2019s downstairs in Sarah\u2019s office.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n From left: Sarah\u2019s living room. Photo: Anne KadetLen\u2019s living room with a gridded wall system behind one arm of the couch. Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

\n From top: Sarah\u2019s living room. Photo: Anne KadetLen\u2019s living room with a gridded wall system behind one arm of the couch. Photo: Anne Kadet\n <\/p>\n

They typically take the stairs rather than the elevator (unless they\u2019re carrying something heavy) and don\u2019t knock before entering each other\u2019s homes. In fact, they had the same lock installed on both of their front doors so the same key opens both units. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to have to carry two keys, and Sarah can never find her keys, so having one key was bad enough,\u201d says Len.<\/p>\n

Each maintains their own bank account and pays the mortgage and maintenance for their own home. But they split the cost of groceries and the weekly housekeeper who cleans both their apartments through a joint account. Sarah sorts and starts the laundry in the building\u2019s basement laundry room. Len, who is better at folding, does the rest.<\/p>\n

This has been their routine for two years.<\/p>\n

When people hear of their upstairs-downstairs arrangement, no one is shocked. \u201cEveryone goes, \u2018Oh my God, that\u2019s just the most ideal situation,\u2019\u201d says Sarah. \u201cAnd it is!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe both get to express ourselves without oppressing the other,\u201d says Len.
There is a danger, of course, that the separate spaces might enable separate lives, so they established a firm rule early on: They never sleep alone. That prospect only came up once during a squabble \u2014 when they were staying in a vacation rental in Cape Cod.<\/p>\n

\u201cI put my foot down and said, \u2018We don\u2019t do that,\u2019\u201d says Len.<\/p>\n

\u201cSleeping separately would be a crime against the marriage, against the relationship,\u201d says Sarah. \u201cBut certainly, there are times when you get on each other\u2019s nerves, and it\u2019s fantastic to be able to go downstairs. When one is upset, one wants to be comforted by objects or things you look at. There\u2019s not a lot of my stuff in Len\u2019s apartment that feeds me that way, except for Len and the cat.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s beginning to change. Despite their ideal of maintaining separate identities, Sarah\u2019s sensibilities are slowly encroaching on Len\u2019s space. She had the TV installed in the bedroom. The hallway is lined with her favorite books and the entryway features her late mother\u2019s Che Guevara poster. When Len wanted to hang more industrial grid over his living-room sofa, Sarah nixed the plan. \u201cEnough with the grid!\u201d she says. She is hoping they\u2019ll find the perfect oversize painting to hang over the couch. \u201cI want to get a tripod and a projector and use that wall to watch movies. That would be perfect,\u201d counters Len.<\/p>\n

Perhaps a third apartment is in order? Apartment 8G is for sale.<\/p>\n


\n See All<\/p>\n

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