Marketing PLG a Century Ago--And Now
Bob Marvin comes through again! Our discussion of 68 Midwood Street on Monday prompted the hardcore brownstoner to scan this ad he had in a frame on his wall. The advertisement shows 68 Midwood and its neighbors at top and some smaller houses one block over. The former were offered for $11,000 and the latter…
Bob Marvin comes through again! Our discussion of 68 Midwood Street on Monday prompted the hardcore brownstoner to scan this ad he had in a frame on his wall. The advertisement shows 68 Midwood and its neighbors at top and some smaller houses one block over. The former were offered for $11,000 and the latter $7,500. According to our calculations, if 68 Midwood Fetches its asking price of $1.495 million, the house will have appreciated at an un-bubblicious annual compounded rate of just under 5%.
In other PLG news, The Post gave the nabe a glowing profile yesterday:
If you’re panning for real-estate gold, you can strike the mother lode with Brooklyn’s Prospect Lefferts Gardens. It’s an increasingly popular neighborhood full of gorgeous townhouses, but it’s also a place where real-estate bargains still exist.
The article pegs price ranges for Lefferts Manor at between $1 million and $1.6 million and $625,000 and $875,000 for greater Prospect Lefferts. It also notes that there are currently NO condos in PLG–though some are in the works.
HOTD: Midwood Not Mid-Priced [Brownstoner]
PLG: Hot Prospect [NY Post]
i guess the tag takes into account the potential for additional development of the land.
but still….
here’s the massey knakal sales pitch:
http://www.masseyknakal.com/search/search_frame_top.cfm
ummmm, whoa. check this link. affixed to the post’s plg opus is a house on hawthorne listed for 2.2 million american dollars. i actually live directly across the street, am a staunch PLG partisan but i can’t fathom this price tag. it’s a huge stand alone, but damn, for 2.2 million i’d be living like tony montana in the dominican republic somewhere. check it out.
http://www.nypost.com/realestate/lefferts_on_the_market_realestate_.htm
Does anyone have original marketing or sales information on other Brooklyn brownstone neighborhoods? I’m curious as to how other neighborhoods were developed and what they originally sold for.
Anon. 3:27,
I think the “comfortable” middle class was a lot LESS comfortable 100 years ago (AND much smaller than now–although I fear we’re heading in that direction again).
” back in those days I imagine there were not the wide range of debt instruments to let you buy such a place with 10% down.”
I’m no financial expert, but i think “balloon mortgages” were common then–interest only being paid, with the entire principle coming due at the end of the term. That was OK as long as you could refinance, but in economic downturns people lost their homes in large numbers. Self-amortizing (sp?) mortgages were va bgreat improvement. (Increasingly popular interest-only mortgages scare the sh*t out of me, but that’s a different story).
I don’t believe that calculation is right. That would mean comfortable middle class salaries in Chicago ($1200 to $3000) per year would be $26,587 to $66,467 in 2005. That doesn’t sound right.
Anon. 1:58,
I see your point. That’s how Manhattan was developed in the 19th Century–an inexerable march of identical brownstones making their way uptown; urban rather than suburban, but sprawl nevertheless. IMO Lefferts Manor could be called urban, but the distinction is a minor one at most.
Maybe – but they didn’t pay income tax back then.