Go, Go, Gowanus! The Times Weighs In
Gowanus goes under the New York Times microscope this week with the bottom line of the story going something like this: Real estate developers have already staked their ground in the hopes that the area along the canal will be rezoned to more favorably accommodate residential while brownstone hunters who are willing to walk a…
Gowanus goes under the New York Times microscope this week with the bottom line of the story going something like this: Real estate developers have already staked their ground in the hopes that the area along the canal will be rezoned to more favorably accommodate residential while brownstone hunters who are willing to walk a few short blocks to nearby Smith Street and Park Slope can find deals at significant discounts to those two areas. The evidence?
Earlier this year, Ms. Walker’s firm sold a town house in need of some renovation on 11th Street between Third and Fourth Avenues for $825,000. On Seventh Street, Bonnie Coape-Arnold, an agent with Brooklyn Properties, sold a three-story, two-family town house with an owner’s duplex for $760,000.
With unsurprising optimism, Hal Lehrman, co-owner of Brooklyn Properties, sums the investment thesis up: “There’s a lot of potential in the whole Gowanus area. You’re between very expensive neighborhoods, so it’s a no-brainer.”
Some See Venice, Some See a Canal [NY Times]
If you go to the Buildings Department, you will find that it is zoned PARK SLOPE WEST PERIOD…If some of you believe that this area is not BOOMING then you are just living in denial. The properties in PARK SLOPE WEST are appreciating every day. In 5 years you wont even recognize the area you are writing about today. It also sounds like some of you dont OWN property in the area, and that is a shame. I do, I took the RISK and I am Happy with the appreciation of the Neighborhood, and my investment.
Time will tell what this neighborhood will become. The signs are here and we should appreciate that transition and not try to belittle it.
there are $1.25 million condo units being sold on seventh street (between third and fourth avenue)?!? i don’t think anyone in their right mind would pay that now for the location when you can buy apts next to the park for that price.
But what of the sewage?
Now that buildings are going up on fourth avenue, those “run down” houses in gowanus are getting sewage.It seems that the sewer overflows can’t even get the stuff out into the gowanus fast enough.
I’ve commented on this area before … it was gratifying to see that the NY Times real estate section also knows there is life beyond 4th Ave! For the record, I have never heard anyone call our ‘hood G-Slope out loud. I did make a bid for GoSlo at one point (Gowanus Slope – get it, get it?) but it didn’t stick.
Yes there are some very shoddy DIY/Home Depot renovations in our SE corner of Gowanus, but you can always do what we did … strip out the crap and make it spare and modern on the inside, with a quasi-historic “painted ladies” type facade renovation on the outside. Then move in and revel in your proximity to the F and R trains!
I really wanted to buy in Gowanus when I was house hunting 3-4 years ago… I’ve always liked the neighborhood “as is” (South Brooklyn Coffin Factory, anyone?) with the added bonus of proximity to both C. Gardens and P. Slope for days when you feel like a little more gentrification. And it was affordable. The problem– to echo an earlier poster– was the housing stock. All I saw were unbelievably horrible gut renovations (eg PermaStone siding used as an interior finish!) and paved-over backyards. I have vision, but not that much vision.
Buy now…and cry foul when toxicity testing of the area comes back to haunt you…
10 years is nothing. The house I bought in Clinton Hill for $300k in 1990 is easily worth three times that 15 years later. Buy in Gowanus now if you can.
James Cornell is a moron and doesn’t know anything worthwhile about Gowanus. It “will” be a very hot area in the future. But your talking maybe 10 years. Not only do you have to wait for a zoning change (the community will not grant variances and there is a lot of opposition to a zoning change) which will be likely in the future, there is also a huge amount of enviornmental clean-up that needs to be taken up by the city, state and army core of engineers. Maybe we’re talking 5-10 years before a project along the gowanus is really something to take seriously. Whole foods will be an anchor for 3rd St. and welcome additional retail but Whole foods is going to be a commuter store, certainly not the destination type of retail needed to really spark the area and create a viable frenzy for residential. All the developers I know already own parcels or are looking for parcels but buying based on speculation is extremely risky considering the majority of properties are zoned for manufacturing. I do feel that the project at 333 Carroll will be a home run as well as any property that is zoned residential west of Bond. The gowanus area won’t change too much within the next few years. Why anyone would call it anything besides Gowanus is silly. If any neighborhood has a personality and history it’s Gowanus!!!
this area will be huge.
gowanus offers the greatest potential for price appreciation and neighborhood improvement. get before the prices skyrocket much further. by the time they open up the whole foods market with its promenade, it will be too late…
and while i make it a general point to detest r.e. agents, the one who said “no brainer” hit the nail on head…