That September, an inspector determined that workers had plastered over fire sprinkler heads and ordered the building vacated. Residents came home from work to find the building padlocked; they lost their security deposits.

Yet after only a few months, construction restarted. This summer, the building began filling once again, advertised on Craigslist under varying names, like “the Sweater Factory Lofts” or “the Rustic House,” for $2,800 to $3,800 a month.

And the violations piled up. The building has been cited for, among other infractions, working without a permit, lacking the necessary certificate of occupancy and violating a stop work order.

The building manager, who would give his name only as Reuven, said most violations were the responsibility of the previous owners. He said he was speaking on behalf of a company called North Side Lofts LLC, which took over in October. (The Web site of the city’s Finance Department lists different owners, but those people said they no longer owned the building.)

The building is now “100 percent up to code” and all violations have been resolved, Reuven said. (The Buildings Department’s Web site still lists more than a dozen open violations.)

The city’s hands seem to be tied for now because tenants in the building have applied for coverage under the loft law, which offers legal status to lofts that were occupied continuously for 12 months from Jan 1., 2008, to Dec. 31, 2009. A pending application, which can take years to process, prevents landlords from evicting tenants. It also makes the Buildings Department less likely to prosecute landlords.

“We take all this stuff very seriously. That’s why we’ve been out there numerous times,” said Ryan FitzGibbon, a department spokeswoman. If the owners of 239 Banker continued to flout the law, she said, it would be possible to take them to court. But with the application pending, she said, “The agency will work with the loft board on this situation to try to legalize the conditions.”