Next Victim in Crashing Market: Affordable Housing
Is New York going to assume Asbury Park’s old moniker, “Beirut by the sea,” so called for the half-built construction projects littering the town? Well, probably not, but now added to the various stalling or halting developments around town are affordable housing endeavors, reports the NY Times. Not all the news is bad — Jonathan…
Is New York going to assume Asbury Park’s old moniker, “Beirut by the sea,” so called for the half-built construction projects littering the town? Well, probably not, but now added to the various stalling or halting developments around town are affordable housing endeavors, reports the NY Times. Not all the news is bad — Jonathan Rose’s East Harlem affordable and market-rate project has secured all its financing, and he thinks he’ll get the money for two more projects soon. “Affordable housing is said to do better than other real estate sectors in a bad economy because government subsidies are available, land and construction costs fall and demand for the apartments rises,” they write. “But because of the toll that the credit squeeze has taken on financial institutions, busy developers like Mr. Rose may be more the exception than the rule.” Even successful projects are plagued by a recurring problem here in New York: there just aren’t enough units to go around. Palmer’s Dock, a building crafted from a former garbage transfer station in Williamsburg, with rents from $398 to $920, saw 13,000 applications for apartments; they have 113 to rent.
Affordable Housing Deals Are Stalling [NY Times]
Beruit by the sea? No, more like apartheid era Johannesburg, or Buenes Aires, with a central circle of the affluent surrounded by the massive numbers of poor needed to service them. Scary, if you ask me.
I really don’t want to hear whining about “fair” from those who have no clue what real unfairness is. It’s not fair that some people have no chance to get a decent education, or can go to college, or trade school, and thereby get a skilled job paying a wage that would enable them to have a market rate apartment, or buy a home. It’s not fair that some kids grow up in a home where no one is educated, and no one cares to see that their children are. It’s not fair that some people work long hours emptying bed pans, mopping floors, taking care of other people’s kids, or slinging burgers in order to make just enough to be ineligible for help, but not enough to make ends meet. It’s not fair that minimum wage for an hour will barely buy you lunch at the fast food restaurant you work in, and you are only going to get 8 times that in a day, before they take out taxes.
So please. Affordable housing is the least of what this society should be doing, and God bless those that are still trying to do it, especially in this economy.
Its about time the city subsidized affordable eating, too many of us have not tasted seared foie gras.
dont you know dave? those people are expected to commute into the city 5 hours to and back from the outer far suburbs of pennsylvania to make their minimum wage! duh
-rob
exactly crimson. one of my biggest pet peeves (which is why i shot back with “move to beverly hills”) is because sometimes people will always respond with, well if you cant afford new york city, then MOVE OUT you have no right to live here.. okay i sorta get it, but NYC has always ALWAYS had people of every single socioeconomic class contributing. people will say “well if youre poor you wouldnt move to beverly hills would you?” well no shi+ sherlock because Beverly hills wasnt FOUNDED by immigrants and working class people. it was an area totally designed from scratch for rich people. grrr. on a lighter note, thanks to you guys i was able to capture those fruit flies last night 🙂
-rob
Hellllloooooo? Not to be politically incorrect here but where are all the people going to live who work in the kitchens of all the restaurants that we are reviewing, in construction and other jobs where they can’t afford $1200 a month.
true, but at the same time you won’t be attracting new immigrants, who really bring the creativity and lifeblood to this city, if you create a structure that is financially burdensome and maintains those already in place without regard to those (otherwise) coming here.
NYC cannot price out lower and middle income as it will destroy the NY cultural and social characteristics that have made city the dominant metropolis of the US, if not the world.
Pretty much every major cultural contribution we have given (music, art, education, etc) has been because of the socio-economic melting pot we have created.
‘i simply cannot believe that we have affordable housing at all.’
Some, can’t beleive that we have 5 million dollar attached houses.
I would be somewhere in between on those two extreme views!!