An End to the Real Estate Recession in Brooklyn?
The Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable, hosted by the Brooklyn Historical Society, met on Tuesday to discuss, among other things, whether the economy has finished receding, as some analysts conjecture. The Brooklyn Eagle reports that David Kramer, chair of the roundtable’s steering committee, said: “Perhaps we are at the bottom [of the recession], and there’s a…
The Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable, hosted by the Brooklyn Historical Society, met on Tuesday to discuss, among other things, whether the economy has finished receding, as some analysts conjecture. The Brooklyn Eagle reports that David Kramer, chair of the roundtable’s steering committee, said: “Perhaps we are at the bottom [of the recession], and there’s a long journey ahead. But at least there’s a journey ahead. Even if there is a light at the end of the tunnel, however, the real estate biz is still in the tunnel. Speaker Mark Caller of the GLC Group noted, for example, that despite relative success with nForth and professed optimism about an upcoming project at 163 Washington Avenue in Clinton Hill, developing in the city nowadays is a “nightmare.” Of course, bad news for developers can be good news for buyers: the original plan at nForth included only hook-ups for washers, but in the current market, GLC also provided washers and dryers with every unit. This is good news, of course, only for buyers who can afford to purchase in today’s economy.
Are We At The Bottom of the Recession? [Brooklyn Eagle]
mopar — it’s definitely possible the guy was scamming, although my gut feeling is he works for the owner who lets him charge any fee he can as long as he gets the place rented. He’s almost certainly not a licensed broker but probably does have some type of relationship with the owner (probably relative or friend of family).
As for cash transactions… I don’t do those.
And as for the recession… hopefully the worst of this is over and at the macro level things will begin going up from here. I’m suspicious of S&P 1000, but I’m certainly not going to complain if it stays above 1000.
But unemployment is not going to peak for a while yet, so until the unemployment rate starts moving down, I’m not expecting much more than stabilization at best in the real estate market.
11217, I was not referring to Ideal. I was referring to Northslope’s original post about the scam artist posing as a broker posing as an owner.
so the economic recession, if you’re calling that two quarters of negative GDP growth, certainly looks like it’s ending. Not exactly sure what a “real estate recession” is. Feels like prices are off the lows from March/April but I have the feeling it may be a little while before you see year over year increases.
Mopar:
Are you referring to Ideal, because they most definitely do have storefonts…one is on Berkeley Place and 7th Avenue (absolutely gorgeous office) and then they have another office down on 4th Avenue.
They are most definitely legitimate…like I said…I’ve had about 5 people I know use them and LOVE them.
I agree, much of Brooklyn was underpriced before 2000. I’d be surprised if prices fall much farther than they already have. But I don’t have any great hopes for the economy.
Northsloperenter, these guys are all over Craigslist. 9/10 of the postings in the owner section are from them. Thing is, they’re not even licensed brokers. And managing agents don’t charge a one-month fee.
It could be a scam. I found an apt I liked through one, then he wanted everything in cash, no contract — forget it. I wasn’t sure I would even end up with an apt after it was all over, since there was all this hoo-ha about some painters and the apartment not being ready and so they didn’t want to give me a key immediately. Crazy.
If you’re going to fork over all that cash up front to a broker, use a legitimate one with a storefront in the area.
Well, perhaps I will contact Ideal if I don’t find anything soon.
I had kind of a bad impression of them because they spam craigslist with so many ugly photos, but sounds like they could be worth checking out.
Although my real plan is for the place I’m going to see tonight (which really *is* a no fee from an owner) to be great so I can put in an application tomorrow.
I’ll also say that Ideal Properties was a good broker experience.
gemini — My impression is that he is acting as agent directly for the owner and was not an employee of a real estate company; he wanted a 1 month fee. He had the usual slimeball broker hard sell patter down pretty well, so I’m sure he does this regularly.
From the look of the place, the owner is the type who prefers to maximize rental income by cramming as many 20 something singles as possible into the space and would rather have high turnover, high occupancy, and high rents than a stable building with long term tenants.
Which is fine. People can run their buildings however they like, but I certainly don’t want to live there.
Could be a nice place. Building is a brownstone on Berkeley, but the interior is in bad shape, the entryway had been converted to a bedroom, the kitchen was depressing with a hideous flickering overhead fluorescent light.
The backyard was quite large and a complete mess — would cost a few thousand dollars to make it some place you would actually want to spend time in, assuming you could get Time Warner to do something about the 7 or 8 cable wires that are actually running across the ground…
lechacal — thanks, will be in touch.