Top 5 Stories on Brownstoner This Week: Stage Is Set for Two Big-Time Developments

This Massive Development Site Will Utterly Transform Dumbo
Right now, it’s just a parking lot. But when 85 Jay Street went on the market two weeks ago, every developer in the city took notice. Residential development at the site — which takes up an entire block — could increase Dumbo’s current population by 44 percent. And condos there could sell for more than those at the nearby Pierhouse — where apartments start at $2,850,000.

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The Insider: A Quick, Cost-Conscious Townhouse Reno in South Slope
In just five months, architect Alexandra Barker of Barker Freeman gut-renovated a petite (16 feet wide by 35 feet deep) four-story brick row house. She turned it into a sweet triplex for a family of five, plus a garden rental — and she did it while saving money wherever possible.

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5 Interior Design Trends That Will Be Big in 2016
There’s something inexplicably electric-feeling about being in a space that seems of-the-moment, and there’s no better time than the end of a calendar year to examine what design trends are best poised to embody the now of the future.

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Sale of Dime Savings Bank Officially Closes: Brooklyn, Prepare for Your Tallest Tower Yet
It’s a done deal: Downtown Brooklyn’s neo-Classical Dime Savings Bank has officially sold to developers Joe Chetrit and Michael Stern for $90,000,000. The 100,000-square-foot individually landmarked Roman temple look-alike at 9 DeKalb Avenue most recently housed a JPMorgan Chase branch, until the bank put the building up for a sale a year ago. While Chetrit and Stern entered contract for the landmark this summer, the purchase was completed last week.

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In Search of the Perfect Brooklyn Brownstone, New York’s Real Estate Unicorn
Brooklyn’s residential market for brownstones will start 2016 on a high note. Longtime readers know that the competition for “unicorn” townhouses — well-located, well-priced homes with original details, a hefty width, and nice neighbors — can be fierce. Lately, larger brokerages have brought a greater number of Brooklyn brownstones into the marketplace, even as international, all-cash buyers continue bidding up properties in prime neighborhoods, according to The Real Deal.

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