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February 11, 2009

Wednesday Links

ultraclay-021109.jpg
Beer Distributor Makes a Deal for Red Hook Piers [NY Times]
Gehry’s Software Keeps Buildings on Budget [NY Times]
Paterson Still Considering Tax on Wealthy [NY Post]
Council Considers Nixing Pull-Down Store Gates [NYDN]
A Chance for the Non-Rich to Buy [NY Observer]
109 Montague Sells for $3.7 Million [Brooklyn Eagle]
River Cafe Owner Expanding to Red Hook [Brooklyn Paper]
NYPD Forced To Cut 2010 Police Class [NY1]
Photo by ultraclay in the Brownstoner Flickr Pool




Posted by Brownstoner at 8:28 AM | Comments (19)
Categories: Daily Links

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Good news for Red Hook, at least a few real jobs with likely staying power.

Posted by: dittoburg at February 11, 2009 8:57 AM

To continue the "what's middle class" discussion from last week... The NY Observer article refers to a center for an urban future study, then calls Manhattan its own city (?) "Manhattan is far and away the most expensive city in the United States...Queens...had the fifth highest index score". The article goes on to say "The standard definition of middle class is people making 80 to 120 percent of the middle income in a given area. According to the most recent survey, taken in 2007, the median household income in New York City is $48,631, which puts families earning between $38,905 and $58,937 in the middle class." Presumably Queens is back as a part of NYC in the latter quote.

Meanwhile the Daily News and US News and World report both cite the study released by the Center for an Urban Future to say that in NYC you need to earn six figures to make middle class.
http://www.nydailynews.com/money/2009/02/05/2009-02-05_nyc_so_costly_you_need_to_earn_six_figur.html

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/luxe-life/2009/02/09/it-takes-6-figures-to-be-middle-class-in-new-york-city.html

Or, a link to the CUF report itself...
http://www.nycfuture.org/images_pdfs/pdfs/CityOfAspiration.pdf
But that's 52 pages - who has the attention span for that?
A quote from it...
“What is middle class?
It depends when you got into the real estate market,”
says Jay Greenspan, a freelance writer living in Brooklyn.
“If you got into the market 10 to 15 years ago, you
can earn $75,000 a year [and be middle class]. If you’re
trying to get in today, it probably takes $250,000.”

Posted by: Bklnite at February 11, 2009 9:32 AM

Yup, Bklnite, that last quote is spot on, everything is relative.

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at February 11, 2009 9:35 AM

Not to nitpick, but 109 Montague St. sold for $3.7mm, not $3.9mm as stated in the link above.

Posted by: SnarkSlope at February 11, 2009 9:39 AM

One use of middle class is being middle income earning. The
2nd definition is of a supposed lifestyle.

Posted by: Petebklyn at February 11, 2009 9:40 AM

Yes Pete. I'd agree with you that both are valid definitions but when the numbers are so egregiously misrepresented as in the median of $46,831 for NYC then all the data is irrelevant and, frankly, wrong.

You can't include Queens in the data for Manhattan given the disparate costs of living (primarily housing) and expect to get any valid number. It's just plain stupid.

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at February 11, 2009 9:49 AM

That is definitely nitpicking.

Posted by: dittoburg at February 11, 2009 9:50 AM

Speaking of nitpicking, I think when someone points out an error and it is corrected, Mr.B should blackline the correction. Otherwise, comments such as Snark's above appear to not make sense. And we all know that every comment every one of us makes always makes sense!

Posted by: Biff Champion at February 11, 2009 9:55 AM

Thank you for nitpicking about my nitpicking.

Posted by: SnarkSlope at February 11, 2009 9:58 AM

What are you talking about? It says $3.7 MM. :)

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at February 11, 2009 10:01 AM

I've worked on Gehry projects that were designed with "his" software (it's really just a modification of Dassault's plane design software) and I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that 99% of the Times article is total BS. The software models are riddled with errors, are worse than useless for generating reliable estimates, and are no better at picking out conflicts than Autocad. And as for his statement about the Beekman skin being no more expensive than a typical building envelope: if you believe that I've got a bridge to sell you.

Posted by: GorBlimey at February 11, 2009 10:18 AM

Well, as long as we're talking about controversial income levels and such, what about the federal deficit and AMT? It seems to me that when times are good, we spend the windfall on all sorts of projects and when times are bad, we borrow and spend billions (trillions) in deficit spending.

Look at this chart:
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FYFSD

Someday we're going to have it run surpluses people! I haven't looked at a chart like this before but can this be correct that we've only had meaningful surpluses during the internet boom madness?!

And re: AMT, a tax that was meant to ensure ultra-wealthy didn't escape tax, why does someone that's middle-class (Center for an Urban Future study) have this tax (and not the normal graduated tax system) as the tax they have to pay?!

Now that I'm on a roll ... If what the Center for an Urban Future study says is true and its over 2x more expensive to live in NYC than Houston, why aren't the federal tax brackets adjusted for this disparity?!?!

Posted by: Mr Joist at February 11, 2009 10:44 AM

"You can't include Queens in the data for Manhattan given the disparate costs of living (primarily housing) and expect to get any valid number. It's just plain stupid."
- but you must include all together if you want NYC stats.
Very misleading to take a wealthy section of 1 city and compare to entire 2nd city. We don't take Pacific Hts stats from SF and then compare Detroit. Makes no sense to say what you need to be 'middle-class' and live in rich neighborhood. TO take to extreme - what does it take to be middle class and live are Park and 68th?

Posted by: Petebklyn at February 11, 2009 11:01 AM

All of which points out a painful lesson taught in my college statistics classes- you can do anything with numbers. One reason why I am so skeptical usually of statistical analysis-

that graph is a little vague. Was the big spike the Clinton surplus? And I think there was a great surplus for a lot of reasons besides the internet boom. But that drop off when Bush took office- omigod.

Posted by: bxgrl at February 11, 2009 11:24 AM

Clinton increased taxes. Bush reduced them. Thus, the disappearance of the budget surplus.

Posted by: Back40 at February 11, 2009 12:22 PM

"...I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that 99% of the Times article is total BS. The software models are riddled with errors, are worse than useless for generating reliable estimates, and are no better at picking out conflicts than Autocad."

That's what I was thinking when I read the link, GorBlimey. Managing a building project budget is more art than science. No algorithm can swing that.

***Bid half off peak comps***

Posted by: Brownstones Half Off at February 11, 2009 12:22 PM

OK, another comment despite my semi-retirement from this blog:

http://www.wnyc.org/shows/lopate/episodes/2009/02/11/segments/123525

Listen to this Leonard Lopate show about how NYC market is likely to go down by at least 30%....

Posted by: Miss Muffett at February 11, 2009 12:33 PM

"semi-retirement"

Aha--I see that pre-fix sneaking in there. Nice to see you muffett.

Posted by: wasder at February 11, 2009 3:13 PM

re 109 montaque: In the early 90's the store front contained a pharmacy. The owner of the pharmacy was also the landlord. I used to clean floors for a living and he was one of my contracts. I was in my early 20's at the time and he told me how during the mid 70's they (he had a partner in the pharmacy) were offered the building for $50k. His partner was not interested, so he bought the building. Soon after he bought his partner out.

He told me that it got to the point where the apartments above the pharmacy (9 studio apartments from what i remember) have been bringing in more money then the pharmacy. So he decided to close the pharmacy (since daune reade was opening in the area soon) and just rent the space to the book store.

Before he left he said to me "If you ever get a chance, invest in real estate...it was the best thing that ever happened to me". A few years later I sold my buisness and bought a commercial/residential building in an area full of vacant store fronts and run down apartments. It was the only area I was able to afford at the time. The area...5th avenue in center park slope. The old man was right....best thing that ever happened to me.

Posted by: landlord at February 12, 2009 7:06 AM

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