I am sitting somewhere around $7000 and I haven't touched the brick pointing in the back of my house or the lawn. 

Insurance, taxes, lawn maintenance/appliance repair.

If there is a lawn, make sure lawn care is the tenants responsibility.  

If the areas get enough light and is suitable for a lawn, make it a lawn.

No lawn maintenance to worry about in NYC, but make sure you get snow shoveled immediately or the city will fine you. 

.- Why buy a house you have to all the work on yourself (mowing the lawn, watering the grass, etc) when you could live in an apartment building with an on-call maintenance man to do the work?

You need to get in front of things like cleaning, dishes, mowing the lawn, shoveling snow, etc.

There is also some concern (i don't have details) about the level of condo fees and the suspicion that they are being set artificially low on new build.

Lawn care is the only thing I can think to add to your list.For tax purposes you'll have depreciation over the holding period as well, but that's not really a "cost", more of a "consideration" as you run your numbers.Good luck!

You need to make sure you don’t see maintenance issues, the lawn is cared for to your standards, there’s not 10 cars there, it hasn’t been junked up.