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February 16, 2007

Friday Links

houses
Rowhouses, Cobble Hill. Photo by fake is the new real.
Home Prices Fall in More Than Half of Biggest Markets [NY Times]
EV Couple Can Boot Rent-Control Tenants [NY Post]
Case of Nerves on Rent Rules Hits Owners [NY Sun]
How Good Are Zillow's Estimates [RE Journal]
Oro Condos: Now For Sale [Myrtle Minutes]
Thinking of Spring: Fence Replacement [Forum]
Brownstoner Bloggers Going Full Time [Colin O'Malley]
Feedback on 649 Washington Open House [Brooklynian]

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Comments

Re:EV Couple.
This happens all the time...I wonder why this instance is newsworthy?

Posted by: Anon at February 16, 2007 9:01 AM

This story has been in the press for over a year.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:06 AM

The size of the building they are taking over is unusual.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:07 AM

Nice pic of Verandah Pl.
I see #4 Verandah just sold for $999k.
Sold to an LLC with Granite City, CA address. Never saw this on the market and seemingly a very cheap price.
Anyone know the real story?

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:16 AM

Re: Rent Control Article

Seeing as how that one tenant has been paying $625/mo or less for a one bedroom since 1978 you'd think he would have saved enough money by now to come into the real world or market rate rents. I guess not.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 9:23 AM

that's right, C-Roy...base all your assumptions about how someone should be living simply because their rent is low.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:40 AM

c-roy,

perhaps the person doesn't make much money so could not save?

Posted by: june at February 16, 2007 9:45 AM

9:01, this doesn't happen all the time. this is not the same as an owner taking a regulated apartment for their own use ... they emptying an entire stabilized building. 9:06, the story has been in the news for a year because the lawsuit has taken that long and the unusual precedent. june, thanks....

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:53 AM

Spare me Anonymous 9:40,

Listen to Mr. Putz's whining. "My fear is I won't be able to live in the city anymore." Well boo god dammed hoo. I must have missed that Amendment to the Constitution that protects his right to live in the EV, in someone else's property mind you, nearly for free. Rent control laws are immoral in part because they breed the type of entitlement mentality on display here. Just disgusting. The truth is that this little dose of reality is probably the best thing to happen to the good people of 47 E. 3rd St. since, lets say about 1978.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 9:54 AM

yo, C-Roy, being heartless is a WHOLE lot more immoral than rent regulation.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 9:56 AM

i know that block, it faces the park.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 10:03 AM

C-roy: I can only hope that someday someone tells you how and where you can live your life.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 10:21 AM

It really is shocking, many of these rent regulated tenants. You can't even find a 1-bedroom in CHICAGO in the ghetto for $625. Why would anyone have symathy for this guy?

Hello, you can't afford to live ANYWHERE in the US without free money from somebody. The only place for you is a trailer park! There is a reason they exist!

Posted by: Eryximachus at February 16, 2007 10:28 AM

how long does it take for you to get up off your ass? 2 decades seems like overkill to me unless you're handicapped.

Can my taxes and utilities be stabalized?

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 10:44 AM

C-roy is not immoral. It is rent regulation that is immoral. Stealing from taxpayers to subsidize layabouts. There is no inalienable right to live in lower manhattan.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 11:00 AM

and wasn't it you, Eryximachus, who was whining the other day about how hard it is for 20-somethings who BARELY make "six figures" and whose parents are too poor to help, to find living space?

Shouldn't you should be heading out to that trailer park in Podunk?

Posted by: Bx2Bklyn at February 16, 2007 11:03 AM

Hey Anon 10:21 I want to live in a 2,500 sq foot loft in DUMBO. I am willing to contribute $1,000/mo and I expect you and Anon 9:56 to subsidize the rest of my rent for the next 30 years. And you two better not dare try to tell me how and where I can live.

What's heartless and immoral is to support a policy that robs a man of the god given ability to do for himself. Anon 10:44 got it right. Unless someone is handicapped or mentally retarded (which I am sure the Post would have mentioned if it was the case) it not heartless to demand that after 29 years, I repeat 29 years, they be able to stand on their own two without some govt. enforced subsidy.

"Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him."
- Booker T. Washington

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 11:18 AM

if( Eryximachus == C-Roy) you have a truly conflicted and pitiful soul.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 11:23 AM

I am my own living, breathing, thinking human being. Eryximachus and I are just kindred souls.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 11:27 AM

Get rid of rent regulation and what do you do with those who are elderly and handicapped? Sometimes it does make fiscal sense to subsidize rents. I lived in a rent stabilized building for a number of years, and one of the tenants was mentally handicapped. The city subsidized his rent so that he could live on his own, instead of in an institution. He had a job as a dog walker, but that wouldn't have covered much more than basic living expenses. They probably should've just tossed him out on the street, right?

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 11:40 AM

"There is no inalienable right to live in lower manhattan."

but there is an inalienable right to decent housing, and not just for disabled people. poor people have human rights too:

"International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, article 11;

Housing of the very poor — if they have any — tends to be built with low-quality materials, often lacks running water, sanitation facilities and electricity and is often located in unhealthy environments far away from basic services. It is frequently insecure as a result of legal or arbitrary evictions and the inability of the poor to pay even a minimal rent regularly. Additionally, poor housing has a major impact on the exercise of other rights, such as the rights to health and employment."

http://www.un.org/events/humanrights/2006/links.shtml

you cannot just assume across the board that property holder's rights trump the human rights of the people occupying the property. they don't.

Posted by: sylvia at February 16, 2007 11:44 AM

Then you have the hustlers who past the rent stabalized apt to diffrent family members like it's an heirloom.

It sucks that landlord is always the bad guy.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 11:47 AM

Subsidize the rent owed to the landlord, not handicap the landlord so certain individuals can get over.

In certain cases, people cannot afford to live in the city. That doesn't mean they don't have a right to live in the city. These people should get some help from the city. But why should the owner of a building bare the brunt of the responsibility to ensure these people can live affordably?

To hell with rent stabilization. Pull the entire city on the carpet and subsidize these folks. If you're going to tax the hell out of the owner, then don't mandate that some Mo can just live here endlessly for $600 bucks a month

Posted by: NewStoner at February 16, 2007 11:55 AM

11:40 - No, but they should have tossed you out on the street.

No one has argued against help for the handicapped. In fact I specifically stated that there should be help for the handicapped or mentally retarded. Re-read my 11:18 post. In a perfect world that help would come from a private charitable organization and not the govt. but that’s a discussion for another blog.

I understand about your handicapped neighbor but what was your excuse for taking the city's subsidy.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 11:56 AM

Let's not mention all the real estate subsidies and tax breaks landlords and developers get, shall we?

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 11:59 AM

11:44 I think you are talking about an entirely different isssue.

No one is saying Mr. Putz doesn't have a right to quality housing. He just doesn't have a right to quality housing in the East Village for $625/mo. See the difference.

Take your $625 move to Jersey or BX or Queens and catch a longer train or get a roomate.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 12:03 PM

11:59. We've found a point of agreement. I say get rid of those subsidies too.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 12:05 PM

Hey, C-Roy...you got a problem with how NYC operates? Then maybe you should move.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 12:40 PM

The free market "let the poor go the wall" sentiments on this site are repulsive. I'm also pretty sure they are motivated by jealousy of those who happen to enjoy affordable rents. Look people, in 1978 the East Village was a f*** of a scary place to live. And I'll bet that building is just a no-frills, clapped out, walk-up tenement. It's not like those tenants have been enjoying luxury housing for all these years. And as someone who recently owned a small coop in a walk-up and paid $450 mtn, I can tell you that collecting $625 in rent per apt is enough to run the building in the black. It's pure manipulation of the existing laws for the new owners to assert that they are converting a 15-apartment building into a one family. If one of them has a Greek shipping magnate for a papa, why don't they buy an empty building and convert that? This is a sad day for all New Yorkers who care about the preservation of affordable housing.

Posted by: NeoGrec at February 16, 2007 12:56 PM

Though C-Roy's tone is harsh, I agree with what s/he is saying, because my worldview is informed by having busted my backside off to get good grades in (public) school and, during the summer, experience and credentials (working for cash and interning in the public sector) from roughly age 14 (9th grade, when GPA starts to matter) to 25 (when grad school ends) so that by the time I'm in my thirties I can pay off, if I'm lucky, grad school and undergrad loans and afford a brownstone in Brooklyn that I *share* with tenants, and their foibles, because that's the only way I can afford it.

Now really, how am I supposed to have much sympathy for the guy living in this building for $625 since 1978, when I was barely in elementary school?

This doesn't mean that I dont' feel for him and his plight, or that I would do the same thing were I in the position of Mr. & Mrs. Landlord (in fact I wouldn't), but come on, there's something wrong with this equation.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 12:58 PM

Also 11:59- let's not mention the rent stablized users that drive Escalades.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 1:01 PM

Rent control is a middle class subsidy. There is no economic justification whatsoever for it.

Posted by: anon at February 16, 2007 1:28 PM

C-Roy, 11:40 here. Not that I want to start up a big pity party for myself, but there are those that have handicaps asides from mental impairment. If it makes you feel any better, while I lived in that apartment I worked and paid my taxes like everyone else, and was able to save enough money to buy a small place of my own. I now have the pleasure of being a homeowner with the security that no one can kick me out on a whim. I'm proud of this, and I will gladly pay my taxes if it can help someone in the same situation I was in. Not everyone is a mooch looking to beat the system. Sometimes some of us (no pun intended) just need a leg up.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 1:29 PM

yeah, c-roy, i realize my post didn't directly address the issue of rent stabilization or control. my point was, you and erixxmakkus seem to think that landlords have some kind of god-given right to charge market rates, and if they're thwarted in this pursuit, that's immoral.

my point was, property rights don't rank too high on the morality scale. they get trumped by a host of other factors. so you can say that rent stabilization/control is bad for the city's economy or bad for the landlord's profits, but you haven't made the case that it's so bad that it's immoral.

Posted by: sylvia at February 16, 2007 2:06 PM

what so bad about a landlord making a profit?

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 2:13 PM

Sylvia - it's a good thing the goverment's job isn't based on your prioritization of what's moral (or on xyz social conservative person living in the bible belt).

Posted by: OE at February 16, 2007 2:25 PM

posted by eryximachus two days ago....

This survey doesn't surprise me at all. It confirms the obvious. Most Brownstoner readers are rich and already own their own home. No wonder they love to shout down any new development that occurs in the city. The only possible result of allowing development in this city is their property values will go down.

Meanwhile, 20 somethings like me who barely make 6 figures have poor parents will never be able to afford a place that is convenient to Manhattan.

Thank You Mr. Brownstoner. I shall link to this survey every time the crazy Anti-Atlantic Yard crowd of rich homeowners spews forth their selfish nonsense.

posted by eryximachus today...
It really is shocking, many of these rent regulated tenants. You can't even find a 1-bedroom in CHICAGO in the ghetto for $625. Why would anyone have symathy for this guy?

Hello, you can't afford to live ANYWHERE in the US without free money from somebody. The only place for you is a trailer park! There is a reason they exist!

multiple personalities anyone??????

Posted by: anonymous at February 16, 2007 2:44 PM

"[Y]ou got a problem with how NYC operates? Then maybe you should move."

You sound like one of those radio talk show hosts that say if don't like the President then maybe you should move to France. No thanks, I think I will stay and try to change things for the better.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 2:47 PM

Okay, C-Roy, besides posting tirades on Brownstoner, what exactly is it that you're doing to change things for the better?

And, lest your next retort be a demand to know what I've done...well, I worked as a counselor at a free housing clinic to tell tenants their rights (both the favorable and unfavorable rights), and I helped the tenants in my building buy it from the landlord and turn it into a coop.

So...come on, tell me what you're doing.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 2:57 PM

2:57 and what have you done for the landlords who rather earn a buck than really on crumbs off "The Mans's plate".

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 3:13 PM

Tirade? Sounds like a hit a nerve.

I applaud your efforts to educate people on their rights and hopefully their responsibilities as well. I am not however, going to get in a tit for tat about who is doing more for the community, whatever that means.

I will though, continue at every opportunity, to advocate fiercely for the principles of capitalism and individual property rights that I believe too often receive short shrift on this site and in this city. Hopefully my meager contributions to this exchange will challenge someone to rethink and refine their ideas about real estate, as I believe others on this page have done for me.

Well, enough of my self-congratulatory platitudes. I come in peace and wish you a good holiday weekend.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 3:37 PM

anyone see this article?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070216/ts_alt_afp/afplifestyleusproperty_070216081250

nice...

Posted by: anonymous at February 16, 2007 3:59 PM

"I will though, continue at every opportunity, to advocate fiercely for the principles of capitalism and individual property rights that I believe too often receive short shrift on this site and in this city."

you've got to be kidding me. if the principles of capitalism and individual property rights receive "short shrift" in new york city, where are they receiving "long" shrift? honestly, we're standing in the warm little center of capitalism and property rights, here.

you're trying to make it sound, again, like you're engaged in some kind of moral crusade. for that to be true, you'd have to be advocating for a morally compelling cause against a morally repugnant cause. throwing poor people out on the street because the landlord wants to build himself a mansion doesn't exactly qualify.

Posted by: sylvia at February 16, 2007 4:43 PM

and just to clarify: i don't think there's anything wrong with landlords making a profit and i'm not advocating that the government base our national laws on pure morality (as if such an approach were even possible).

i just take issue with c-roy and the ever-entertaining eryximachus stating their case as if they're on some kind of moral crusade against the cruel, cruel injustices being perpetrated against these unassailable property rights. it's a dishonest rhetorical ploy, when they could just be saying: this is bad for the city's economy, and thus bad for all of us.

Posted by: sylvia at February 16, 2007 4:50 PM

save the bleeding heart crap please. People the guy wasnt poor he was just lazy. Let's not confuse the 2.

I myself have zero tolerance for people who sit on thier fat ass for 30 yrs with thier stubby lil fingers out.

People need to pull thier own weight after 2 yrs or the government needs to investigate and draft the abusers.They can ship them and have them help really poor countries so they can learn and see that they had it good in this land of milk and honey.

Posted by: Anonymous at February 16, 2007 5:03 PM

don't forget sylvia...that we are all supposed to weep ourselves to sleep because eryximachus (who is in his 20's, supposedly) can't get by on his "barely 6 figures." i'm sorry to be so judgy, but after a comment like that, it is so clear that this is not a person who bases his life in reality at all. i have a difficult time listening to a word he says after a comment like that.

Posted by: anonymous at February 16, 2007 5:06 PM

oh and btw eryximachus....on the very first page of craigslist for rent in chicago i found this....

$595 / 1br - 7301 S.STEWART

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reply to: dannyrlinvestors@yahoo.com
Date: 2007-02-16, 3:37PM CST

1 BDRM ,HEAT INCLUDED $595 CALL MR.JONES 773-932-7301

73 rd at STEWART google map yahoo map
Location: SOUTH SIDE

you don't have a clue what you are talking about. and now that i've found you a great one bedroom in the ghetto of chicago for less than $625, maybe you'll want to move....please, please????? I won't even charge you a broker fee!!!!

Posted by: anonymous at February 16, 2007 5:11 PM

I disagree Sylvia. NYC maybe the center of banking and finance (though that distinction is slipping away too) but property rights, hell no.

I would argue that NYC real estate market is one of the most heavily regulated and inefficient in the US. If the fact that the Economakises had to go through a 3+ year legal battle to be able to use their property as they see fit is not enough evidence take a look at the needless transaction costs and taxes charged to buy/sell property in the city (lawyer, city and state transfer taxes, mortgage tax, mansion tax etc. etc.) the dense rent control/stabilization laws (fortunately being phased out, but still onerous) and the inefficiencies in the RE market generally (why no MLS in NYC). Believe it or not these regulations do not exist in the vast majority of the US and I believe they discourage development, especially of low income housing and result in higher prices for all.

Sorry to be so preachy with the last post though, probably a little over the top. But I stand behind the what I said.

Posted by: C-Roy at February 16, 2007 5:57 PM

I had a large rent-stabilized 1 bdrm in the EVill for 8 yrs from the late 70s-80s, for $250/month. My landlord and his ninety year old mother lived in the basement, and there were 7 other one bedroom apts in the building. I did the math (taxes, utilities, etc.) and realized that the buliding couldn't possibly be showing a profit - and that was why he was struggling to make repairs and constantly bellyaching about having to lodge his mother in a basement. So I saved the money I wasn't spending on rent and as soon as I could swing it, bought a building in Brooklyn in 1988, with all the space I would ever need - when RE in Clinton Hill was still actually affordable to freelance artists (although everyone I knew thought I was crazy and none of my friends would visit because they were terrified they'd get mugged despite stats that showed the crime rate was higher in the EVill). My landlord gutted my apartment and spent enough on the rehab to get it out of rent stabilization; more power to him - he was a nice guy. But I never deluded myself that I was entitled to live in Manhattan forever at my landlord's expense, and was willing to go somewhere nobody considered "hip" if it meant I'd own instead of rent. Nobody had ever told me that real estate is supposed to appreciate, and I never expected it. I just wanted to pull my own weight and not leech off a pair of seniors living in the basement. As it turned out, if I'd continued to take advantage of the rent stabilization laws, I'd have missed out on the best investment I ever made. I do agree that if and when deregulation occurs, provisions must be made to cover the elderly and disabled. But that's the government's business - individual landlords shouldn't be inequitably burdened with a problem that belongs to everyone.

Posted by: Anon at February 18, 2007 8:22 AM

As a long time "rent stabilized" tenant/resident of the East Village ( We use to just call it the Lower East Side) I read with obvious interest the recent articles concerning the fate of the tenants of 47 East 3rd Street. By chance I happened upon the comments posted on 'The Brownstoner' concerning this matter. Mon Dieu. The term "Bully Pulpit" comes to mind. What has happened to New York? I guess I shall feel no remorse (Je ne regrette rien) in taking "all the money I have saved" living in a rent sabilized apartment for the past 30 years and moving to France to live out my dotage in the lap of luxury. The French have the best medical care in the world, according to a recent UN survey (the United States came in 35th) so I should be in good hands.

Bon Soir NYC

Posted by: General Lafayette at February 19, 2007 12:47 AM

Good night and good riddance to you too Frenchie.

Posted by: jack slade at February 19, 2007 10:51 AM

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February 16, 2007

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