House of the Day: 78 Halsey Street

Isn't it interesting how the color of the building next to it has been applied to the side of this house and cornice?

I would have thought that the indented portion of the house for sale would be the same color and not of the color of the house next door.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:31 PM

The price is HIGH considering you have more than half the tenants in place, and most likely some of them are rent-regulated. Very high for that headache in Bed-Stuy.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:35 PM

This house is registered with HPD, so it definitely has rent-controlled tenants.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:40 PM

Last sold in 2004 for $210K??

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:41 PM

Looks like some black kids must have stolen the front stoop.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:54 PM

Uh oh, it's time for the racial insensitive comments. Let's start comparing this to Park Slope.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 1:59 PM

hey 1:59--you said "Park Slope" first. No one else did.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:01 PM

this building looks like quite the lifetime challenge.
Are the tenants respectable or armed thugs?
That makes a big difference too.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:03 PM

2:03
Maybe the tenants took the stoop, huh?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:05 PM

Considering the neighborhood, they're probably armed thugs.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:05 PM

1:40,

"This house is registered with HPD, so it definitely has rent-controlled tenants."

incorrect. all buildings with 3+ units must be registered with HPD. this does not mean rent-controlled (or stabilized) tenants. for that you'd check with DHCR.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:06 PM

1:46...LOL!

A ClintonHillLady

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:10 PM

2:06--maybe. But in my search for a house, EVERY single home I've seen that's been registered with HPD (all 6) has had rent-regulated tenants.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:11 PM

How much would this house be worth without tenants?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:15 PM

This and the next block of Halsey have several condo conversions but it's already too late in the game to try it with this house. 51 Halsey, right down the block is for sale again because the developer trying to do a condo conversion couldn't get the funding here after the RE market correction/crash.

As for those who are so offended at comments about how bad the current residents may be, the warnings should be heeded. When looking at 51, I spoke with a woman whose been on the block for many decades and owns the building next to this one (or maybe the one with the ornate railing) and another at the other end of the block she live in. She was asked in the past to buy this place and said no cause she knew how hard it would be to get the residents out. She lives there. It's not bigotry, it's real life knowledge of the situation. Pass this one by at this price or at half this price. Just not worth it.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:31 PM

"How much would this house be worth without tenants?"

Don't know, but I'd definitely think about the fact that it last sold for $210K in 2004.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:35 PM

What does another listing on this block have to do with this post, What? Why don't you provide your e-mail address so everyone can send hate mail to you directly.

Having tenants always makes a sale harder and the price reflects that, among other things.

Why is it always assumed on this site that everything should be turned into condos?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:39 PM

The broker is selling it and pricing it specifically as a potention condo conversion.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:44 PM

"Looks like some black kids must have stolen the front stoop."

Poster=Eager to share hatred.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:56 PM

reters in NY espeially in Brooklyn, have strong rights. some would argue that their rights trump the owner's rights, so whether the tenants are regulated or not it would not be easy to evict them. even if they do not pay rent. it could take years. it could get nasty. It will cost a fortune in legal fees.
If one buys a building like this, one has to assume that the renters are there to stay. They really own it, all you have is title which means that it is your reponsibility to maintain the building perfectly and to provide the tenants with all the services they need. It is a screwy system but it is our system. Buyer beware.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 2:58 PM

I think it was meant to make fun of those eager to share hatred and was written with irony. Though I could be wrong...

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:00 PM

Park Slope rocks. I just love it. I love to push my stroller around it's tree-lined streets. What in the world could be better than Park Slope.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:05 PM

3:00

It was. (I mean how the hell can someone steal a front stoop?)

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:08 PM

"Why is it always assumed on this site that everything should be turned into condos? "

Right. That makes this sale price even worse, then. It's split up into 6 apartments, has renters, and there's not one photo of the interior. Converting this back into a 1-or 2-family will cost you LOTS of dough, making the current price and tenant issue even MORE ridiculous.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:08 PM

This neighborhood is not known for having the best quality rent-stabilized tenants. I would be very careful when buying in Bed-Stuy.

Because of the credit crunch, gentrification will come to a halt in Bed-Stuy. Anyone who buys here will be stuck in a low-class hood with (poor) low class people. I need more than Subways, KFCs, Chinese Food and Bodegas in my life.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:19 PM

"Because of the credit crunch, gentrification will come to a halt in Bed-Stuy. Anyone who buys here will be stuck in a low-class hood with (poor) low class people. I need more than Subways, KFCs, Chinese Food and Bodegas in my life."

This is the best comment so far this year!!!!!!!! Plus the asshats will be stuck in the Hood. Oh you got to love it!!!!!!!!

The What

Someday this war is gonna end.....

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:24 PM

"This neighborhood is not known for having the best quality rent-stabilized tenants."

Which neighborhood IS known for having the "best quality" rent-stabilized tenants? I'm just curious.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:35 PM

The What: What is your e-mail address? Fucktard@asshat.com?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:40 PM

This is worth 211K.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 3:54 PM

"Which neighborhood IS known for having the "best quality" rent-stabilized tenants? I'm just curious."

The prime areas of Park Slope.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:00 PM

Oh aren't we high on our little class horse today 3:35

Not all poor people are cretins and FYI - many 'middle class' people are moving into stabablized apartments now. I live in one in PLG and most of the new tenants are white kids fresh out of college who a few years ago would have lived elsewhere, but don't have trust funds.
The rest of the majority are people who have been there for years and are no worse than my ex-neighbors in CG.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:02 PM

HAVE A LITTLE VISION PEOPLE! This is a multi-family, 4 story house with a gorgeous facade, on a great block right on top of the express A train. Under 1 mil. You don't think someone will know what to do with it?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:27 PM

From my experience the very worst, frustrated communist, fucktard tenants are
in the Upper West Side and in Brooklyn Heights. They have the resources to keep you in court for generations.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:34 PM

"Oh aren't we high on our little class horse today 3:35. Not all poor people are cretins and FYI - many 'middle class' people are moving into stabablized apartments now."

Oh. You mean like folks like Ex-preppy/drug addict/killer/cocaine salesman Robert Chambers and other fine folks like Mick Jagger's ex, right?

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h4DjoJu_LoxIg7VCtKuQWI79gY1wD8TGLHF80

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:36 PM

"HAVE A LITTLE VISION PEOPLE! This is a multi-family, 4 story house with a gorgeous facade, on a great block right on top of the express A train."

That's all good, but consider the people in the neighborhood. They litter all over the streets, don't clean up after their dogs, walk around with their pants sagging, speak terrible english, use drugs, have terrible diets and are not educated.

Why would a person who saved their well-earned money take the risk to live around these people? That kind of environment is depressing.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:52 PM

"That's all good, but consider the people in the neighborhood. They litter all over the streets, don't clean up after their dogs, walk around with their pants sagging, speak terrible english, use drugs, have terrible diets and are not educated."

You seem to know a lot about the place. You must spend a lot of time there. Or are you relying on heresay?

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 4:59 PM

4:52, I don't want to buy this building either, but I live a block away and I assure you that you are grossly misrepresenting the population around here. Not that you care.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 5:00 PM

Thanks, Montrose Morris, for identifying the building in the background as the Alhambra. I thought it looked familiar.

Fifty years ago, my parents had a friend who lived there. He was an artist who had a studio in his apartment, which I remember as a rambling place with a winding hallway and tall windows. The place looked like something out of Vienna in 1900 with heavy curtains, rugs, and kilm-covered sofas.

The artist was elderly and very kind to us kids. Whenever we visited with our parents, he never seemed concerned about us rummaging around his easels and paints. (In fact, we were encouraged to paint and sketch to our hearts content while the adults socialized.)

There were lots of artists, writers, and poets living in Crown Heights and its vicinity back then, including Paule Marshall, the Jamaican writer who is still alive, I believe, and made this part of Brooklyn the subject of a book, called, if I remember correctly, "Brownstones, Brown Girl."

In the 1950s, many Crown Heights livingrooms served as salons, where poetry, plays, and books were read by their authors. One woman had a gallery in her big apartment on St. Marks Avenue, where local artists displayed their work. Lots of culture. Lots of good talk. And because most artists had families in those days, lots of kids mixing with the adults, learning about the world.

I was saddened to see the condition of the Alhambra when I drove by years ago, but now it seems in better shape than ever. When I was a kid, buildings like it, although grand, were going down hill, which probably made them affordable to people like the artist. The last time I saw it, it may even have been abandoned.

What happened? And is it a landmark? Of all the buildings in NYC, it must be -- or should be. Indeed, the way it nestles against those beautiful brownstones in the photo's foreground, the whole block should be landmarked.

Nostalgic on Park Avenue

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 5:46 PM

4:52: Please keep your comments about Park Slope to another thread please.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 5:47 PM

For $149K less you can get (sorry, I couldn't resist, even though I know I'll be flamed):

http://oldghent.com/properties/063/description.html

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 6:07 PM

Ghent is in Columbia County, 1 1/2 hours from NYC, straight up the Henry Hudson pkwy.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 6:15 PM

Lots of violations listed for this brownstone. Many violations from as recent as 12/19/07. And since most of the violations stem from 1 apartments, I bet that's one difficult tenant right here.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 6:19 PM

Montrose, thanks for the link! The "before" and "after" photographs are incredible!

Of course, in the old days, what are now three or four "affordable" apartments comprised one unit. Still, it's nice to see the old building come alive, despite the storefronts (which could have been a lot worse, I imagine, without Landmarks oversight).

You would have enjoyed the old interiors. I didn't know then but I know now that the Alhambra was built at a time when developers were trying to draw upper-middle-class and rich families from row houses to apartments and made their apartments as much like single-floor brownstones as possible.

My parents' friend's place seemed to stretch forever. Heavy with molding and panelling, it was also dark, like the neighborhood's row houses. And all occupied by a single old gent who covered the walls with his and other artists' oil paintings. In a word, grand.

NOP

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 6:33 PM

NOP, what are you doing on this blog? You have way too much class? You and Montrose should have your own blog. You two are more informative than the rest of these bozos and your stories are enjoyable to read.

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 8:32 PM

Thanks for the nod, 8:32. I like posting in Brownstoner, if only to remind bloggers that neighborhoods, like people, have stories and deserve respect.
NOP

Posted by: guest at January 8, 2008 11:38 PM

Thanks Montrose, for correcting the title of Marshall's book. Of course, her's is much better!

All this blogging about Crown Heights has opened lots of memories for me, and just tonight's photo of the Alhambra and my recollection of the artist who lived there made me think of scores of people, many of whose names I never knew, who populated this part of Brooklyn, including shop owners, doormen, shoe repairman, street hawkers, park matrons (parks department employees who wore crisp white uniforms in Brower Park), and knife sharpeners (who'd come down the streets in horse-drawn carriages and manually sharpen everybody's kitchen knives -- in the 1950's, can you believe it?). Maybe I'll try to remember specific things about them for a future post.

In the meantime, you're absolutely right. Brooklyn neighborhoods are literature, as Marshall and others proved, not just real estate to be bought and sold. That's what inspires people to perservere in places like Crown Heights and what should encourage others to see their true value.

See you next time on Brownstoner.

NOP

Posted by: guest at January 9, 2008 12:40 AM

Ghent is in the low countries.

Posted by: guest at January 9, 2008 10:28 AM

Its is a beautiful area in Norfolk Virginia called Ghent. It was a area 25 years ago much like Bed-Stuy is now. Today is is like BH and PS had a baby http://www.norfolk.gov/Planning/comehome/Ghent_History.asp

Posted by: guest at January 9, 2008 10:50 AM

Meet the Original Brownstoners of Bed-Stuy
http://renovatingonthecheap.blogspot.com/2008/01/meet-brownstoners-of-bed-stuy.html

Posted by: guest at January 9, 2008 4:42 PM

Thanks for the link, 4:42. Renovating on the Cheap is an attractive, informative site that illustrates Bedford Stuyvesant's residents' passion for their houses and neighborhood. A nice antidote to the naysayers on Brownstoner. The site also has a good crit of many of the comments about the Halsey Street house found above.

I'll return to ROTC again and again and look forward to a walk around the neighborhood, which looks better than good.

Nostalgic on Park Avenue

Posted by: guest at January 9, 2008 6:42 PM

I just don't understand why people move to these neighborhoods or nearby if they hate the people that live in them and insist on being afraid in their neighborhoods and demonize the people that live in them. Why live in NY? Go to Kansas or Idaho if you don't want to be in a city. Or move to the Upper East Side. So bizarre.

Posted by: guest at February 26, 2008 1:19 PM