Judy,

I believe records that old were not included when real estate records became digitized in NYC.

Fern's idea of looking at old newspapers is excellent.  They had real estate transaction columns.

Try this free site of old digitized newspapers (heavily NY area):
https://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html

You can search by name or address (or any keyword.)

When searching by address you may have to try different ways of entering it, i.e. 301 East 8th, 301 E. 8th, 301 E. Eighth, 301 E. Eighth. 

Hope this helps,

Sherri Bobish