I will confess to the impulse toward gleeful What-like rantings at seeing Park Slope and Cobble Hill in the murder zone, and Bed Stuy--where I keep urging cash-strained friends in the whiter parts of town to move and being told they can't because it's not a safe place to raise kids--outside of it.

Posted by: MiceElfAgain at October 20, 2008 3:37 PM in response to North Brooklyn Safer Than South Brooklyn?

I'll join the chorus in support of East New York, and add that eye contact and friendly greetings to neighbors or strangers is a key difference, in my experience, between neighborhoods like Bed Stuy and Clinton Hill, which have been majority black for generations, and upscale (largely white) neighborhoods in Manhattan. The assumption on the street in neighborhoods like midtown or the upper west side is that anyone speaking to you is probably hitting you up or running some kind of hustle. White folks move from Manhattan to Brooklyn with that habit ingrained, into neighborhoods where a lot of folks (or their families) grew up in the rural South, where passing someone on the street and not acknowledging them is actively rude. Different customs, each with its history behind it, but ignorance of local etiquette can easily lead to a sense of alienation and disrespect, and from there to racial hostility. A friendly greeting, a "sir" or "Ma'm" to an older person, can accomplish more than many folks realize.

Posted by: MiceElfAgain at September 8, 2008 1:08 PM in response to Do Generalizations About Harlem Hold for Brooklyn Nabes?

The only problem tenant I ever had was the one I got through a broker, and the problem I had with him was he felt for the rent he was paying ($1200 for a large Clinton Hill 2-bedroom in 2000), I should wash his dishes and pay his phone bill. Luck of the draw, I suppose, but given how easy it is to find good tenants for a decent apartment these days, I'd think the amount of a broker's fee tends to buy some good will on the part of the tenant. Craigslist!

Posted by: MiceElfAgain at August 6, 2008 3:13 PM in response to Spiking Broker Fees in Williamsburg