House of the Day: Stuy Heights Gem
Another beauty from Stuyvesant Heights by way of Craigslist. The 4,300-square-foot two-family is configured as an owner’s triplex over a garden rental. By all appearances (and the broker’s flowery prose) it sounds like this is one of those jaw-droppers, complete with original restored woodwork, wainscotting, and pier mirrors. The 1899 house also has a center…
Another beauty from Stuyvesant Heights by way of Craigslist. The 4,300-square-foot two-family is configured as an owner’s triplex over a garden rental. By all appearances (and the broker’s flowery prose) it sounds like this is one of those jaw-droppers, complete with original restored woodwork, wainscotting, and pier mirrors. The 1899 house also has a center stair with an “intricate oak basket weave design” on the railings and restored golden oak lattice work overhead. Located on Bainbridge off Lewis Avenue, the house is only a couple of blocks from the A train. If all this is true, the asking price of $1,235,000 seems a little lower than we would have expected. What say ye?
Bainbridge at Lewis Ave [Craigslist] GMAP
I don’t get the schools issue. Parents in BS do the same thing that parents in PS do. You look at all of the choices (public, private, parochial) and you choose the school that best fits your kid and your means. That may be a public school or it may not. It may mean that your kid gets on the subway and schleps to another part of Brooklyn or Manhattan or the Bronx or Queens or that they walk around the corner. New York is one of those places where geography does not limit your options. Plenty of kids in Brooklyn take public transportation to school. Its just not that big of a deal.
Very interesting debate on original detail, patina, etc. Sorry, lp, I disagree with you and completely agree with Anon 5:10. I often wonder if I am the only one who does not drool at the site of brownstones drenched in darkly varnished casings, mantles, mirrors, etc.
I have no interest in living in a museum, or feeling that there is no wall space to place furniture, lest I cover the precious period detail. Call me crazy, but I often prefer mouldings painted white, so that I do not have to figure out how to get paint to stick to 100-year old varnish, or worse yet, strip the gunk and false patina (yes, pine and oak can be made to look like mahogany given the right helping of stain and varnish).
I know from experience how taxing this work can be and appreciate the effort owners put into removing that varnish the pretensiously masks the beauty of the wood, implying that it need masquerade as another, more noble species. Nothing against patina, by the way, which normal stripping does not remove.
Give me bright, cheerful woodwork that shows the grain and reflects at least some light. I am sick of renovations that blatantly and sloppily apply stain to achieve this pretensious old-world “charm”. ‘Nuf.
Hey someone called me blind! So where are all the “excellent” school districts in nyc? It’s easy to say they exist, but I’d rather you name ’em. My point was that one might as well not pick their neighborhood based on the local schools because the good public schools are so few and far between that your house search will be quite limited.
Also, my guess is that the person who buys this house will not only put down 10%, so I doubt they will have a $4,000 mortgage payment. Crime statistics are only as informative as the context of the crimes. I’d much rather speak to residents and hang out myself than rely on police stats. And yeah most of what the new residents call Clinton Hill was considered B-Stuy for quite some time, and only the new residents have this obsession with their home falling on the CH side of the boundary. And Stuy Heights is quite distinct in look and feel despite “still being Bed Stuy.”
Lastly, if you don’t want the house for whatever it’s being sold for, then don’t fuckin buy it. You don’t have to make some snide, latently racist little comment.
A note on the Clinton Hill/Bed-Stuy boundary issue. I recently met a woman that was raised on Cambridge Place in the 50’s. Now considered solidly Clinton Hill, she says back then it was Bedford-Stuyvesant.
I don’t have kids, so I’m alittle naive when it comes to schools. What happens when it comes time for middle school and high school? Isn’t that important also? Somehow, I don’t think any of you Park Slope parents are sending your kids to John Jay. Anyway, as 3:49 posted…homes are indeed selling in this area for some decent $, so it’s worth it to someone. Let’s see…a 4300 sq ft beauty in a beautiful, convenient neighborhood or a small vinyl sided frame in a “good” area. It’s a no brainer for me!
Stuy Blkbuttrlie,
You are looking at the comments wrong. The issue is about who can afford that house, not who lives next door. And that little old lady that lives next door to you, while she herself may not be middle class, she is indeed living in a middle class house. To that point, another little old lady identical to your neighbor would not be able to move INTO that neighborhood TODAY. Hence, the point that you must be no LESS than middle class to get in is Valid.
So Middle Class is Middle Class… Black or white! A dollar goes the same distance, no matter what color the hand that’s passing it along.
as far as the comment about schools I brought this up a few days ago when we were discussing a property in flatbush. you pose the question where do people’s children go who live in these areas? where do “regular” kids go to school anyway? because it seems like such a far fetched idea sometimes that everyone isn’t white and wealthy enough to send their kids to brooklyn friends. we get it ps 321 is a good school hoorah but some people can’t afford to live over there and their kids still have to go to school. some people work hard to give their kids the best that they can give and living in a house like this may just be it. NO they don’t have to be a stay at home mom or dad to make something like this work because thats totally unrealistic in the real world when one parent isn’t wealthy enough to support the other or “communities like this” as you’d put it children catch the subway to school by themselves they don’t have martha steward living-esque moms to skip to the bus stop with them or chauffuer them to school in the range but they do have parents who care enough for them to provide them the best within their means. get over yourselves.
Nothing inherently aesthetically pleasing about it except the amount of craft that went into it. These were details that fit the style of the era. Not necessarily beautiful, just trendy at the time, for the developer who built that particular block, like poggen pohl kitchens today. That’s what people showed off with to their friends.
Oh Lord! – I posted the initial comment about not considering this area black middle class and I must disagree with your comment. what is considered middle class and what is really middle class are sometimes completely different as you yourself pointed out. the threshold of class shouldn’t be based on race. I agree with the poster regarding the poverty line. it is what it is, the poverty line is just that and its not one thing for blacks and one thing for whites if you’re below it you’re considered inpoverished. yes, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt in that the amount of money that flies in the “black community” may not go as far in the “white community” (for oversimplification purposes) a la bedstuy vs. park slope or harlem vs uws but that has nothing to do with whether or not you’re middle class. I live in stuy heights and the lady who lives next door to me is an old lady of about 70 who has owned her brownstone for years, for all purposes she’s dirt poor as far as cash and filthy rich as far as property but she wasn’t put in that situation because she was middle class she moved there when bedstuy was a place for people who were dirt poor in terms of cash and it just so happens that the neighborhood is seeing a turn around in her favor. many of the homeowners in the area are like that and that’s what I meant by I wouldn’t consider the area middle class.