Set Speed Condo Report: 364 Myrtle Avenue
Today’s new condo reports focuses on a development that has been profiled on Brownstoner before. Located on a busy commercial stretch of Myrtle Avenue between Clermont and Adelphi, lies this unique 4 story building. Featuring angled windows to take advantage of light and outdoor spaces, this new construction attempts to set itself apart from the…
Today’s new condo reports focuses on a development that has been profiled on Brownstoner before. Located on a busy commercial stretch of Myrtle Avenue between Clermont and Adelphi, lies this unique 4 story building. Featuring angled windows to take advantage of light and outdoor spaces, this new construction attempts to set itself apart from the others.
The site consists of one commercial condo and three large floor-thru duplex condominium units. The ground floor commercial unit measures in at just under 2000 square feet for $994K, while the other three units are 1533-1688 square feet and cost $877K, $890K and $919K. The residential units have 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. Maintenance is about $260 a month.
Units feature 17 foot high ceilings, large gourmet kitchens with stainless steel appliances, en-suite bathrooms, spacious closets and laundry hook-ups. This condo is located close to many amenities, like supermarkets, restaurants, bars and hardware stores. But as last week’s two shootings attest, the area still contains some rough spots. An open house is scheduled March 26 from 12:30 to 3:30pm.
364 Myrtle Avenue [Corcoran] GMAP
New Building on Myrtle [Brownstoner]
Every Thursday, ltjbukem, whose own blog Set Speed scrutinizes the progress and quality of new developments in the area we know as Brownstone Brooklyn, pens a guest post about goings-on in the condo market with an emphasis on new projects.
I agree with everyone, except the idiots on both extremes. does that mean I’m a waffler? can I have empathy for the poor and not agree with current social policy AND own a brownstone and have 2 kids? can I, can I? gee, I SURE hope so…or wait…did I not grow up poor enough…? Oh bother, I guess I’m not equipped with a conscience. I guess I have no right to comment. Oh well (shrug).
So, let’s see, in approximately 12 hours, this thread has gone from:
“Projects should not be on prime property” (1:26 p.m.)
to “. . .these people don’t even need to be in the city” (1:34 p.m.)
to “Like it or not, poor people carry a lot of baggage and once they are gone things always improve.” (2:05 p.m.)
to “This thread has become, at its base, a thread about what rights poor people in a gentrifying neighborhood should have when prices rise to the
point where they can no longer afford to live in the area.” (6:03 p.m.)
to “somehow this “white stroller set” has become fodder for a whole section of our city to attack and critisize . . . . this “white stroller set” was more often than not simply dispaced in the exact same manner as facing the minority resident.”(1:09 a.m.)
Wow.
Lp-I think you do have to be pragmatic but that’s a far cry from being told you have no rights to live in any neighborhood simply because the demographics change. But you also said: “I agree that we need more low income and moderate income housing. I don’t think that people who receive it are entitled to say they want it in a specific neighborhood.” So did you mean that those who aren’t rich should just accept being pushed around by those with more money bcause essentiall y that what will happen. It’s one thing if I can’t afford a neighborhood, it’s another if I am forced out by gentrification. My life gets ripped apart but if you have more money you are entitled to do that?
Not for nothing but poor people pay taxes too. It isn’t racism or guilt that makes people resent the white stroller set, it is the arrogant assertion that now that money is in the neighborhood the residents should simply shut up and move. The white stroller set is not about tolerance or environmental consciousness- it is simply about protecting its own investment. No one is attacking them, just the assertion that if they want it they deserve it.
What I find interesting is that in these threads those that decry the plight of the minority resident being dispaced by gentrification the loudest, are usualy the same ones who speak of what was described as the “white stroller set” in the most contemptuous terms.
Yet in reaity this “white stroller set” was more often than not simply dispaced in the exact same manner as facing the minority resident. I mean face it, most people buying these condos or even Brownstones, if they could afford it would take one a few bocks from Central Park or Greenwich Village rather than in Bed Stuy or Myrtle Avenue. In fact maybe they lived in those areas or similarly post-gentrified areas but expanding families or a desire to own has forced them outside their usual haunts, Wall St job or not.
I dont know if its envy or racism or guilt but somehow this “white stroller set” has become fodder for a whole section of our city to attack and critisize- from left wing radicals to W’burg hipsters – as if they are somehow the mirror equivelant of those who fled the city in droves during the 60’s-70’s.
Yet besides themselves being ‘displaced’ what is even sadder about all this contempt is that this ‘stroller set’ even in its worst form is generally made up of the most tolerant, socially and enviormentally conscious a of our population – think about it, the suburbs are filled with millions of its own stroller set who just decided that they dont give a s*t about any of this crap – they just want space a yard, good schools, and a garage. Yet here are these peope determined to stay in a city they love, despite outrageous expenses, poor schoos , crazy high taxes, crime, etc – ….
So while its fun to create a boogeyman – maybe doing so says more about your own insecurities and biases then about the people you are attacking.
This applies to too many comments on this thread to count:
If everybody could take a pledge not to try to read another poster’s mind, or intuit what they secretly believe rather than what they actually said, or attack them based on what you claim they would do/say in a hypothetical situation… we could possibly get somewhere with this conversation. Yeesh.
sorry for the typos, it’s late, “suburbia” not “suburia” and “hear” not “here”.
Anon 9.39, no one said all people in the projects are criminals.
Bx2Bkln:
What are you talking about? Of course it is not up to a real estate agent or gentrifier to decide where people live. In the case of the projects, it’s the City who owns the land and the buildings and decides where the free and low rent housing will be. In the case of all other property owners, it is the property owner’s decision to sell in a high market or increase rents. Should you blame the working class black families who bought in FG and Clinton Hill in the 70s and 80s when it was very rough and the prices were cheap for selling when the market picked up? Are they sell outs? I don’t think so. I think they were savy and invested well.
As for being poor, I’m white, my family was (as still is) very working class (I’ve been fortunate enough to do better as they worked their cans off and made sure their children worked hard in school so we could get into good colleges (something they did not do) and get good jobs). I know what it is like for a family to live pay check to pay check, not have the newest clothes or cool shoes, have old beat up family cars, a run down house, not go on family vacations often because money’s tight, so spare me the you don’t understand being poor story. I have empathy for hard working people who are still just getting by – my parents are those people.
I think you are reading into peoples’ posts, or at least mine, where you think I’m making judgments as to where poor people “ought to be put”. I prefer an economically diverse community. My income would allow me to live in a gated whitebread suburia, but that would drive me insane. I just don’t think that you should get preferential treatment in your choice of a neighborhood simply because you are poor or because the cost of housing has risen.
We need low income housing and moderate income housing. I think the projects are clearly a social failure and mixed income communities (not segregated ghettos) are the only way to potentially raise the standard of living for the poor. I do not think, however, that low income people are entitled to live wherever they want if their economic situation does not permit them to do so. I’m not advocating making some far off community a new project ghetto, but if you live in the projects, I do not think you should think that you are entitled to live in the same projects, in the same neighborhood forever. It is supposed to be a safety net.
When I was growing up, we moved around for the express reason of finding a better place for us to be economically. In fact, I know my parents would love to live in Brooklyn now too, but they can’t afford it. I’m happy they can come and visit with me and my family now in Brooklyn. They love it here.
As far as some earlier comments that people should be able to buy in they neighborhood they grew up in or where their parents lived, while that is a nice thought and would be great, it’s just not realistic. Neighborhoods change over time. My family’s been in this borough for over 160 years but I don’t here my parents complaining that they can’t buy a place here now. They live in a very modest place in another state because that is what their income allows. I suppose they could say they are ‘victims’ of gentrification and should be entitled to live in Brooklyn because generations before have and they should not have to leave their roots. They don’t think that way though. I don’t think it is healthy to think that way – it is self limiting and causes you to focus too much on what you don’t have as opposed to what you can achieve. Trust me, I’m no pull yourself up from the bootstraps republican – I recognize it’s much more complicated than that and believe the government has a place and responsibility in trying to address housing problems. At the same time, I think you have to be pragmatic in your approach to life or every bad turn in your life will just beat you down and you won’t be able to deal with change.
1. Not all people who live in the projects are criminals. But maybe it’s a crime to be poor?!
2. I happened to like NYC in the 70’s.
3. CHP, Bx2Bklyn and Oh Lord…you rock!!
“We’ll fill all those condos with well educated, attractive youngish people with good jobs in finance, advertising and publishing…”
LOL, CrownHeightsProud, better off living in the projects if you have a job in advertising or publishing.
You don’t make any money in those fields.