That’s not always a given. My life insurance will pay out for a suicide as long as the policy has been held for more than two years. I asked the agent.
No, I’m not planning to kill myself. I was just curious.
Any new construction might be restricted by lotline setbacks as well.
I don’t know about New York, but more than a few people in San Francisco have run into difficulties when they find out that their rebuilt house needs to be at least *x * feet from the property lines resulting in an absurdly skinny sliver of a house, whereas if it was a remodel and the original structure was still standing, the house could continue to touch the adjoining buildings on the 25 foot wide lot.
I haven’t looked up the NYC Zoning Resolution for that particular block, but there shouldn’t be those type of setback restrictions where the townhouse was located.