Goldman Sachs Buying Up Fulton Street
In My Brooklyn Report’s series on urban blight along Fulton Street, Michael Corley notices that Goldman Sachs’ real estate investment arm has taken keen interest in a certain stretch of Fulton Street in Bedford Stuyvesant, buying up at least six neighboring properties in the vicinity of Marcus Garvey Boulevard, including at least one vacant lot….
In My Brooklyn Report‘s series on urban blight along Fulton Street, Michael Corley notices that Goldman Sachs’ real estate investment arm has taken keen interest in a certain stretch of Fulton Street in Bedford Stuyvesant, buying up at least six neighboring properties in the vicinity of Marcus Garvey Boulevard, including at least one vacant lot. In his piece, he raises questions about the possible motives of Goldman Sachs, namely whether the financial behemoth plans to oust locals in favor for higher-paying suburbanite baby-boomers moving back to the city. Mr. Corley’s piece is the second in a three-part series, so we are curious to see if he finds evidence of sketchy political dealings or whether this is, simply, a savvy investment maneuver by Sachs. Update: Looks like this really isn’t such big news. As a commenter points out, we wrote about this a year and a half ago! See the post here. GMAP
Goldman Sachs Finds Opportunity in Bedford Stuyvesant [My Brooklyn Report]
Whose [sic] Responsible for the Urban Blight at 1576 Fulton Street [My Brooklyn Report]
Photo by Jonathan Scheff/Brownstoner
No, MM, not “shoot up.”
ecoux makes a great point. Curb your enthusiasm DIBS. Your endless cheerleading for a NYRE rally strains credibility to say the least.
As I recall, there was a plan to build a condominium building on that site – with retail on the bottom. There was also a plan to build another condo building across the street where the outdoor market used to be (which I thinkw as being developed in coordination with Restoration Plaza). I had seen renderings for both projects.
See link for article on Brownstoner about the Goldman projects. http://brownstoner.apperceptive.com/archives/bedford_stuyvesant/
Many of these properties were purchased at the end of ’07, arguably near the top of the market, and at a time when the Atlantic Yards had more luster as a development project. With AY being scaled back (both in size and cache) and a city in recession I’m not sure I’d get too worked up about imminent displacement.
DIBS – seriously, are you suggesting NY RE is going to shoot up in price this year? Stagnation has widely been considered the most optimistic scenario (for sellers, that is), with further price declines considered likely. If you are saying prices are set to rise this year, please provide your explanation.
theandrewlee…except for Throop St and malcolm X, there isn’t a lot of commercial property around. To be able to get a number of parcels like this in ANY neighborhood is going to work to their advantage in developing something. This is a choice location for development. I think they did their homework.
i pass this strip everyday and any new stores would be a great improvement. i hope they don’t sit on it and do plan to bring in some quality retailors.
I think there are two possibilities:
(1) GS believes in the long-term (5 years+) speculative potential of the area and is buying up property.
(2) GS has some inside knowledge from a Govt or Business insider about what is going to happen along “a certain stretch of Fulton Street in Bedford Stuyvesant”.
I think (2) is more likely. If they were really interested in Bed-Stuy in general, wouldn’t they be buying more broadly? Or as part of a larger strategic bet? Why clump it all in this spot? Maybe I’m missing something, but they are probably smarter than me. After all they convinced the Government to hamstring their competitors and insure their bets (AIG, etc.).
I think they are going to move their HQ there.