To echo slick's point about how BH has changed, in the boarded up store fronts that were where the theater on Court is now, there was a prior theater. It showed porn. Anything on the east side of Clinton was viewed as on the edge of the Heights. That plus needing work could get you a house for less than $500k.

Posted by: intheshorts at October 3, 2009 5:15 PM in response to Open House Picks: Six Months Later

I sometimes wonder what many of the commentators here do for day jobs given the volume of comments. Usually, I'm working during the day and observe what's going on here in the evening since I am expected to focus on what I get paid for when I'm in the office. Any way, since it seems my memory is being called into question as to the availability of homes in BH in the mid 90s (since it appears many readers were in their teens or had less financial resources), I checked property shark for yesterday's HOTD. According to the site, a mortgage for $350k was registered on 7/18/95 after a deed was recorded on 7/6/95. So the sale price was probably high 300s. If I erred in my recollection of price, I think I was within the sampling error. House definitely needed work and I expected to spend money on that.

But for those who think there were no homes below a $1 million in BH, all I can say is you were not here looking. As a young professional making decent but not outrageous money then, our budget was about $500k. We saw houses all over BH and CH. Wasn't interested in PS so we didn't look there so I can't speak to prices there. What I do know is that the price I paid for the place I bought was about what the previous owner had paid in the late '80s as NY real estate had already done the rocket up then crash and burn and was only beginning the recovery in the mid '90s. That owner did better than the one who sold the State St HOTD as it looks like he paid at least $437,350 in 1986, again according to property shark. An example of the '80 exuberance.

About the $2.5mm high water price in BH in 1995, I recall that the highest trade in BH recently was something in the range of $20-25 million. So if you compare top end to bottom range of the brownstone market, you see a 7-8 multiple between then and now. Nothing too surprising there.

Posted by: intheshorts at October 3, 2009 11:46 AM in response to Open House Picks: Six Months Later

The crowds from the theater mostly stick on Court as others have noted. Most people don't go down State without a reason. There's much more of a problem on Schermerhorn where all the people try and park when they come to the theater. Since Clinton forces you to the left at the end of the block, State is much quieter. The theater itself is an imposing building so it creates a buffer from Court. As to it burning down, I doubt it. Modern curtain wall construction doesn't burn. Stuff inside can but the building is basically fireproof. I do have visions of the theater failing as they have all around the country and then watching it get imploded as there is no alternative use for the space. Has to be one of the ugliest buildings in America.

Posted by: intheshorts at October 1, 2009 4:38 PM in response to House of the Day: 171 State Street

Back in 1995 when we were expecting our first child, we looked at this house. It was a quirky place. Most everything was original including the plumbing. There were sinks in the closets in the bedrooms. The house was very narrow. The garden was not at all dark back then. For those who remember, before the theater there was a strip of boarded up storefronts on Court that ran the length of the block which was only one story high so there was plenty of light. Despite the quirks, my wife loved the house. If I remember right, the asking price was around $375k. I offered $300k and I think we agreed on something like $350k. While the contract was in negotiation, we found out about the potential demolition of the storefronts and construction of a large building on Court. We worried about living next to a construction site for what could be a very long period with an infant. So in the end we decided to pull out. Bought another place in the Heights instead. After watching how long the development took, we were glad that we decided to pull out. I heard that the people who bought the house had lots of problems when the contruction on the theater started and got involved in a law suit because of damage to the house. This was a good one to miss at the time. Though if the owners get close to their price, it looks like things will have worked out.

Posted by: intheshorts at October 1, 2009 4:05 PM in response to House of the Day: 171 State Street

I will bore you dear readers with some irrelevant facts. Building was originally the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce and completed in 1929. An inauspicious start. The building in one of the 2 reasons that local law 11 exists. Back in the 80’s when it was still an office building I believe, a chunk of the terra cotta came off and killed a pedestrian around the same time a similar event happened at a Columbia owned building in Morningside Heights (common Heights theme?). The conversion by the sponsor was done on the cheap and resulted in years of litigation between the residents and sponsor. The terra cotta that everyone admires is unbelievably expensive to maintain. That along with the crappy conversion job by the original sponsor has lead to higher maintenance costs along with sizable assessments (ouch). But the board has done a great job of getting the building into great financial and physical shape. As I pointed out before, the conversion was done on the cheap and the original fit and finish of the original apartments reflected that. Most of the apartments in the building have had some degree of renovations completed now. Its up to you as an owner to do what you can with your space. We gutted our place and what we found ran from terrazzo floors, brick arches, steel columns and terra cotta interior walls. We incorporated some of those elements into the renovation. I will end by echoing the point that if what some consider a uninspiring space in the Heights goes for 300 or so, step back from the falling knife that’s going to cut right through the rest of Brooklyn.

Posted by: intheshorts at July 9, 2009 3:59 PM in response to Co-op of the Day: 75 Livingston Street, #7B

Fighting the worldwide financial crisis of the past 18 months along with the registering requirements has resulted in me making almost no comments on this site. On the occasions I check BS’er, I see the same commentators rehashing the same points. But today, I see my building so I feel obliged to make some observations.

This is a B unit in the lower part of the wedding cake. It looks out towards Court so basically you’re right across from the Board of Ed office building. On 7, I don’t think you will be high enough to clear that building so your view is of an office building. Windows are large – about 7x5 so you get a lot of light despite not having a view. Apartment size is actually over 900 square feet if I remember the details correctly for the floor plans in this part of the building.

As to the maintenance, yeah its more than $1 a foot, but that’s the benchmark I was told to use when I bought my first apartment in 1990 so why shouldn’t this go up as every other expense has over the past 20 years? Covers the usual stuff of building mortgage, taxes, heat, maintenance, building staff, etc., the kind of stuff that many readers of BS’er don’t seem to pay.

The building went co-op in the 80s and the conversion was cheap and boring. But many of the apartments have been renovated, some in spectacular fashion over the 25 years and the fact that there are multiple layouts has created many wonderful apartments that makes the building so much more interesting than the basic cookie cutter new places.

As to the 25% down, it does limit who can purchase, but at the same time it protects the building from people stretching to buy a place, getting over their heads and having problems later. Not unusual for a co-op. Actually on the low end. Residents are young professionals, DINKs, families and retired people – basic boring community that everyone seems to hate about the Heights, but I enjoy it.

Posted by: intheshorts at July 9, 2009 2:09 PM in response to Co-op of the Day: 75 Livingston Street, #7B

Ah, you pointed out the problem in the very last paragraph. It looks like the wood floor is glued to the concrete substrate. There is no wood sub-floor. This is a very common shortcut used in apartment conversions. A proper installation would have had a plywood sub-floor installed first. Ideally there would be 2 layers which would be screwed to the concrete. The wood floor would then be nailed to the plywood. The glue under your wood floor has separated from the concrete. The problem is that the concrete is dimensionally stable and the wood, especially if its pine is not. Any moisture, which can include ambient humidity can cause the wood to swell and buckle. If this is recent as you say, it will probably go down as the air drys out with the heat coming on. But watch out in the summer, it will likely come back. The only real fix is to tear out the floor and install a sub-floor. As a stop gap, you can get someone to cut the floor boards thinner and reglue them to the floor, but don't be surprised if you see this happen again. I was on the board of a co-op that was converted in the 80's and this was a common problem in the building.

Posted by: intheshorts at December 30, 2008 3:23 PM in response to Speed bump in our livingroom!