House of the Day: 15 Clarkson Avenue
This new listing at 15 Clarkson Avenue in Prospect Lefferts Gardens is a beauty. It’s dripping with original woodwork and has an attractive modern kitchen as well. The current only paid $540,000 for it back in 2007, but we’re assuming he’s put some work into it since then. The current asking price is $789,000. Achievable…
This new listing at 15 Clarkson Avenue in Prospect Lefferts Gardens is a beauty. It’s dripping with original woodwork and has an attractive modern kitchen as well. The current only paid $540,000 for it back in 2007, but we’re assuming he’s put some work into it since then. The current asking price is $789,000. Achievable for this location?
15 Clarkson Avenue [Douglas Elliman] GMAP P*Shark
Brooklynista:
Flameworthy scenario? Its the scenario that plagues many homeowners in today’s times. The people that are going to be able to afford this house will most likely not be sending their kid to any zone public schools or partaking in the majority of the neighborhood businesses on a regular basis. My objective was not to put fear in anybody’s heart, or to bash the neighborhood. But instead to give an honest perspective. The good points were already covered, so I offered a few of the bad ones, thats all. No neighborhood is perfect. But many times people don’t do research, and forums like this should be geared in some sense to help with that. So when it comes to highlighting a neighborhood, all positives and negatives about should be expressed for so everyone gains knowledge with correct information.
If you think its a great place to live, then thats great. I myself even said in my initial post that I wouldnt mind this house for myself. But its not for everybody.
Aj– my reference to your “cluelessness” was not a comment about your knowledge of PLG. Instead, I was referencing your flameworthy scenario. In it, “the family from the Upper West Side that chooses to move here will get the absolute shock of their lives.” First of all, what kind of family are you talking about? But, ok. Let’s buy into your highly stereotypical scenario and assume that the UWS family is white, urban-ignorant and middle-class and that it engages in the equally unlikely act of dropping $700K+ on a house in an unknown neighborhood, in another borough, without doing any advance research on the prospective new surroundings. Should they suddenly be surprised come Labor Day weekend that their neighborhood of choice is largely Caribbean, I would think that the “shock of their lives” at that point would be long overdue . . . and much deserving. But let’s get real, AJ, Your whole scenario is plain ridiculous. So what’s the real point of it? To put the fear of the Labor Day weekend/Flatbush Avenue black devil into the hearts of unsuspecting, naive white folk? Yeah, I thought so.
Fact is, the kind of people who move to PLG are, by and large, those who love the homes here, love the surroundings, love the affordability of the area and find value added in living with great neighbors in a thoroughly diverse urban neighborhood. While it’s true that some are unable to make the change from being one of the majority to one of a minority, most do. And, in the process, they make the adaptive changes that challenge most “minorities” in any social circumstance. Indeed, my own family — which is neither white nor Caribbean — moved to PLG more than 20 years ago and we’ve not regretted that decision a day since. If anything, we are delighted that we bought here when we did and, as such, were able to get in on one of Brooklyn’s best kept neighborhood secrets when it was significantly more affordable. Along the way, we’ve learned to love the flash, heat,color, sound and rhythms of the Caribbean that comes to the hood every Labor Day as much as we have loved joining the daily pedestrian parade on Flatbush Avenue with neighbors of every race, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, income group, etc. BTW, we don’t LIVE on Flatbush (just shop there on occasion) and our daughter did not attend high school at E-Hall (or any high school in Brooklyn, for that matter.)
In our book, PLG is a great place to live. It’s also a neighborhood, like many others in NYC, that is in the midst of major demographic transitions. If there is any admonishment I would offer to prospective new residents it’s this: if you’re not interested in living in a rapidly changing, culturally vibrant and diverse, seriously social urban community with great housing, parks and public transportation . . . then PLG is not for you. All others are quite welcome!
Just to clarify, my comment that “AJ” was sort of right referred to his/her 1:14 post rather than his/her 1:53 rant.
BTW, given the unique nature of this neighborhood, I doubt that it was ever really appropriate to refer to “pioneers” here, BUT, IF it ever was, it would have been long before 1974, when I moved here.
Brooklynista…I am very familiar with the neighborhood, I have family there. And while its not exactly the OK corral, the majority of Brownstoners will do nothing more than go to work and come home because they are definitely not hanging around there after dark. And trust me the whole of Flatbush turns into the devil Labor Day weekend. During the summer weeekends, its pretty much a scaled down version. The neighborhood is loud and always congested. Closest stop Parkside Avenue on the Q train….hot spot area again. Like I also said before, public schools around there suck too. Did I miss anything? Or is around here Park Slope’s little brother? Not by a long shot. I have no problem with pioneers, but know what you’re getting into. Somebody more accustomed to the type of quality-of-life situations that plague Flatbush will be comfortable here, that’s all i’m saying…
I’m late to this thread, but, FWIW, I very much agree with Brooklynista and Traditionalmod. Why would a poster like Tracel be so eager to display his/her ignorance?
Aj is sort of right that Labor Day weekend might be a shock because of the parade spillover, but not really more so than moving near the route of any other massive parade plus, like any such celebration, it’s only once a year.
AJ you are as clueless as Tracel.
Nice place for a non-gentrifier like myself.
However, the family from the Upper West Side that chooses to move here will get the absolute shock of their lives Labor Day weekend.
Zoned high school is E-Hall…ha! good luck with that…
ditto what Traditionalmod/Brooklynista said. Tracel clearly has no idea what’s going on in PLG today.
I own on Clarkson. Basically the same house. Same block. My wife and I agitated for street trees, and guess what? There are 18 new trees on the block.
I mention it only because the primary difference between our block and many others in PLG is the trees. The trees, and by extension the house pride shown by the longtime owners of these brown and limestone buildings. That pride led to landmark status, and more house pride, and a good $300,000 per/house premium. That’s a lot of money for the same house a couple blocks away. But there it is. And guess what? We didn’t have the extra $300,000 laying around. So we made a nice garden out front and agitated for street trees, that by the way took forever in coming. But we’ll always lag the rest of the ‘hood by a few hundred grand…we simply don’t have the decades of charm with which to compete.h
Why less than half the cost of the exact same houses JUST AS CLOSE to the park in Park Slope? Hmmm. Worse restuarants. Fewer coffee places. More hair salons. Not as nice schools. All true. And um…race? Hmmm. Nah. Not in color-blind liberal Brooklyn…must be the foie gras, wi-fi and dog-curbing that accounts for a million bucks.
Btw, seen one two-story/english basement Brooklyn brownstone seen ’em all. The “floorplan” is YOUR job.