Steel beams crisscross the gutted interior of the 1930s building in Manhattan’s West Village neighborhood; they are there to temporarily brace the shell of the structure until new floors are poured inside.

But not because the redbrick architecture is rarefied in the usual sense. On the contrary.

This was until recently a no-nonsense parking facility, with nothing more elaborate on its facade than plain block lettering spelling out “Greenwich Village Garage.” Now, however, the building, 125 Perry Street, the new name for what will be a boutique condominium project, will contain seven ultraluxury units, four of which have already been sold, including a penthouse for $57.5 million.

A second penthouse, measuring 7,700 square feet with six bedrooms and expansive outdoor terraces, is on the market for $85 million, a staggering price that nonetheless does not seem to be deterring prospective buyers. “Three to four people are circling,” said Jim St. André, one of the brokers marketing the property for Alf Naman Development and Ascendant Capital Partners.

Across New York, developers have snapped up dilapidated parking garages in desirable neighborhoods, tearing down the old structures to make way for housing.

It’s not only luxury housing: The West Side Federation for Senior and Supportive Housing, a nonprofit, acquired three parking garages on West 108th Street from the city and demolished two to make way for an 11-story complex that opened in 2022 and contains nearly 200 apartments for poor and formerly homeless New Yorkers. The group plans to tear down the third garage and erect a 12-story project with 84 senior apartments in the new year.

“It’s so hard to find any sites at all, so if you have an older parking garage that for whatever reason is not structurally sound, that would be a great site for affordable housing,” said Paul Freitag, the group’s executive director.

This spate of garage-to-housing conversions comes after concerns over the condition of some of the buildings. In 2023, a parking garage on Ann Street in Lower Manhattan partially collapsed, killing one person and injuring five others. In the aftermath, inspectors rushed to assess other garages.

Some owners decided to sell the buildings rather than deal with problems that were brought to light.

After a garage at 220 East 9th Street in the East Village was shuttered in 2023 for structural issues, the real estate developer Arcus purchased the property and demolished all but the floor on the ground level. Now, rising above it is a new six-story building that takes inspiration from historic redbrick buildings in the vicinity, said Roger Bittenbender, an Arcus principal and co-founder. It will contain 18 loft-like condos with industrial-style windows.

“The goal was to make it look like an old factory,” Mr. Bittenbender said.

Uptown, the city’s Buildings Department declared a garage at 214 West 80th Street “imminently perilous to life” in 2023, according to signs posted on the property at the time.

Terra Developers, which acquired the building in February, at first considered knocking it down. “I even ordered demolition plans,” Yana Morgan, the project manager, said on a recent tour of the property.

But the 1906 structure, which originally housed both a parking facility and a new-car showroom, had some of the same attributes as the West Village garage: large window openings, high ceilings and big, open volumes that suggested the potential for loft-like residences.

The buff-colored brick facade could even be regarded as dignified: Under peeling paint, the lower portion of the building appeared to be granite and limestone. “Apthorp Motor Car Co.” had been carved into the lintel above the middle garage-door opening, under a scrolling medallion that stands nearly 4½ feet tall. (The garage, like the nearby Apthorp apartment building, bears the name of a onetime landowner in these parts.)

So Terra switched its plans, and now structural repairs are being made to the building’s concrete-encased steel beams, after which the facade will be cleaned and repaired and six large-scale condominiums — one per floor — will be constructed inside.

“You’re selling a piece of New York City history here,” said Alexander Zhitnik, founder and principal of Z Architecture, which is working on the renovation.

In the case of 125 Perry Street, which is in the Greenwich Village Historic District, the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission required preservation of the exterior. But the understated shell came to be regarded as part of the appeal of the project for superrich, privacy-seeking prospective buyers.

Retaining the shells of these former parking garages can also speed a project timetable, and in some instances it can minimize construction waste, a major problem.

But conversion is not without challenges: For one, the former parking garage at 214 West 80th Street has no insulation — there had been no reason for a climate-controlled environment for parked cars — so a “thermal envelope” must be added inside the shell, Mr. Zhitnik said.

A booth on the ground level formerly used for the garage’s attendant remains, for now. Eventually it will be removed and the space devoted to bike storage.

But in this building, as well as in 125 Perry Street and 220 East 9th Street, a feature of the past will stick around: parking spots.

At 125 Perry Street, there will be two on the south side of the building, one for each of the building’s penthouses, and one on the north side that will belong to a townhouse portion of the project. The East 9th Street building will have 10 spots.

On West 80th Street, there will be two, reached by one of the garage’s old door openings. They will be up for grabs, Ms. Morgan said, just like the apartments in the building, once an offering plan is approved.