Major Change Coming to Long-Derelict Apartment Building on Bushwick Avenue

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The long-empty and boarded-up apartment house at 889 Bushwick Avenue — it was built in 1919 and for years has sported a spray-painted “roof off” warning to city workers — is being repaired. When we stopped by Saturday, it looked from the sidewalk as though the interior had been completely gutted.

A permit says the scope of work is “removal and replacement of damaged floor joists, roof joists, and structural stabilization.” It had 24 apartments in the past, and will have 24 apartments again when the work is done.

The owner is David Cohen of Bushwick Realty Holding, which purchased the building and its neighbor at 871 Bushwick Avenue, in April 2014 for $15,000,000. That building, formerly the Menorah Home for Aged and Infirm, is being converted to a “nonprofit/philanthropic” with “sleeping accommodations” for 113 people, according to the alteration permit.

In fact, as far as we can tell, Bushwick Realty Holding purchased the entire block. So more development could be in store for parts of it now used as parking.

The red and white brick building, vaguely neo-Classical, at 889 Bushwick Avenue was designed by architect Louis Berger & Co., according to the Bushwick Wiki. It is part of the proposed Bushwick Avenue Historic District. Click through for more photos.

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