New downtown condos topped out: A new condominium building at 250 Bowery, the latest project from Adjmi & Andreoli Architects, has topped out at eight stories and is shaping up enough to show off residential floor plans and renderings of the gleaming, modernist block that will contain six floors of apartments (with two retail floors below) fronted by large industrial-style window grids on on a newly-hot stretch of Lower Bowery between East Houston and Prince Streets. The new condos–work is scheduled to be done at the end of this year–will include 24 apartments with four duplex penthouses priced at $2.7 million and up (CurbedNY).

Last unit sold at 80 Metro; two left at 58 Metro: The 123-unit waterfront condominium building at 80 Metropolitan in Williamsburg, developed by movie studio head Doug Steiner of Steiner Studios, has sold its last apartment. Two units–a one-bedroom and a two-bedroom–are still available next door in sister building 58 Metropolitan, where residents will be able to share 80 Metro’s amenities like an indoor pool, yoga room, fitness center and landscaped courtyard (DNAinfo).

Huguette Clark apartment co-op board nixes would-be buyer’s combo plan: The two enormous apartments at 907 Fifth Avenue belonging to recently deceased heiress/recluse Huguette Clark are still on the market for $19 million and $12 million after their sale to a buyer who wanted to combine the two fell through. The building’s co-op board said no to the combo of the two apartments comprising the building’s eighth floor, which would have made the resulting residence one of the largest floor-through residences on Central Park (NYObserver).

Building permits way up in 2012: According to the city’s Department of Buildings, there has been a notable uptick in building permits issued in Manhattan this year, representing a significant amount of construction activity compared to the relative stagnation of recent years. The department has issued 35 permits for hotels, residential buildings and an art gallery so far in 2012, a 169 percent increase over the same period last year (WSJ).