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| 262 and 264 Sullivan, soon to bite the dust. More from DNAInfo |
Is this a bad thing? Depends on your perspective. Are you one of the incoming renters? Are you selling and retiring? Are you a neighbor? Are you someone who fears height and density? Are you someone who bemoans yet another lost opportunity to demand more affordable units from developers? Is this the sort of block that deserved protections, or is density better suited here than, oh let me just throw one out there at random...Empire Blvd? I'm just taking a piss of course, because we all know we'd be wrapping up a Planning Study around now if it hadn't been for...she who shall not be named. Seriously, she won't. Not gonna do it.
The other day someone was telling me that the worst of the development boom was over, because there just weren't that many more spots to build. Hilarious. Basically, anything is possible. For instance, one wouldn't think you could take a perfectly good building full of rent-stabilized apartments and go condo with them, during an affordability crisis and all...but guess what! You absolutely can. 35 Clarkson was about as affordable as you could get on my block...til the stabilized apartments started going for north of $350K two years ago (they've jumped in price since). The AG even signed off on this giant puppy up in uber-trendy Crown Heights:
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| 382-90 Eastern Parkway Goes Condo. Story here from Real Deal. |
They will disappear, if, and when...(all together now):
It becomes profitable to do so.
7 comments:
Sad to know that AB duped Sullivan St residents into thinking that she was fighting for them.
Hi, Alex,
That's "Sullivan Place". Sullivan Street is out in Red Hook. :)
that's such a good point alex. but of course she's curiously silent on this issue..
Not that too many people will miss it, but the striking dilapidated building on the corner of Bedford and Church seemed to come down over night.. Was hoping the city owned it and would fix it. No money in that though. Money talks and you know what, walks.
-josh
2BRs are selling for 600k+ in 35 and 41 clarkson. Here is the thing - it is still a percieved deal. 750 to 800 bucks a sq ft only 2 blocks off the park has buyers all sorts of hot to buy. So it might sound crazy to most of us, but 'The Leff' (as i now hear it called) seems to be one of the final ticks of the clockwise progression of property spikes around the park.
It's farfetched, but what about approaching affordability from the opposite end? Once upon a time, affordable units were simply market rate units in older buildings. But, because of all the costs in both money and time, to build or renovate or raze-and-build-again, that cycling of buildings is almost entirely broken.
It sure seems counter-intuitive that allowing a lot more expensive buildings to be developed would – eventually – result in actually affordable units being available. But that's exactly what, for example, Jane Jacobs described in her writing.
Certainly all parts of the city should bear the burden of the disruptions of development, but as it is there are only two classes of winners: those that already enjoy all of the protections that keep people in their current houses or apartments, and those able to afford the small fraction of housing subject to something like a market.
I wrote "actually affordable" above because what is now currently labeled 'affordable' is really just game prizes won thru luck (or fraud). Affordability via lotteries is a sham.
Kenny is right--only by having more units can the stock grow larger and the crunch ease. So getting rid of single homes is a no-brainer. And if the CBs could get behind MIH, then there would be an easing in the middle of the market that would reduce competition for existing affordable slots. Since developers can't afford to build for truly low income residents, vouchers will need to pick up the slack--that means more enforcement against landlords who refuse them.
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