Brooklyn real estate Booming

All you folks on the fence about moving to the suburbs for better prices and more space. Give Brooklyn a consideration. You've got the beach, a couple of very nice golf courses, great parks and probably some of the best restaurants in New York City.

https://therealdeal.com/2021/10/25/5-5m-condo-with-massive-great-room-tops-brooklyn-luxury-contracts/

Brooklyn is a suburb

Amen to that!

Love the streeteasy logic triangle:
Who wants to move to a suburb, suburbs suck!
Move to Brooklyn instead if you can't afford Manhattan!
Brooklyn is a suburb!

The days of moving to Brooklyn because you can't afford Manhattan have long past! Certainly in the '80s/some of the '90s this was true for many. If they were going to make the move to New York City, they were going to live in Manhattan! That was the dream...

It's hard to say exactly when it happened, I'll peg it to around 15 years ago. Brooklyn became a first destination as many of Manhattan's neighborhoods lost their charm, and the traffic and congestion became overwhelming for some.

Before all you rich finance, tech and law people took over ; ) Brooklyn had plenty of folks who wouldn't dream of living in Manhattan, even when it was very affordable. Why would you want to leave Brooklyn to go into 'the city'? Brooklyn has it all! Fougett about it!

The days of moving to Brooklyn because you can't afford Manhattan have long past! Certainly in the '80s/some of the '90s this was true for many. If they were going to make the move to New York City, they were going to live in Manhattan! That was the dream...

It's hard to say exactly when it happened, I'll peg it to around 15 years ago. Brooklyn became a first destination as many of Manhattan's neighborhoods lost their charm, and the traffic and congestion became overwhelming for some.

Before all you rich finance, tech and law people took over ; ) Brooklyn had plenty of folks who wouldn't dream of living in Manhattan, even when it was very affordable. Why would you want to leave Brooklyn to go into 'the city'? Brooklyn has it all! Fougett about it!

There is a dirty secret of why BK became more popular. Manhattan real estate taxes for resales in non prime areas such as Midtown east and FIDI are very high relative to BK. Maintenance/Common Charges are much higher as there are fewer non-doorman buildings and unions are more entrenched. In BK, you have the choice to live in a non-doorman condo with low CC and some cases really low taxes.

Call it 3000 sq ft. Maintenance $4200. In Manhattan prime areas without park view, it will be min $6500 if not more. So $2300 per month. $28k per year. At 3% cap rate. Appx $900k advantage for this apartment vs Manhattan.
https://streeteasy.com/building/9-prospect-park-west-brooklyn/11c

Here's another beautiful Brooklyn home, right off the park!

https://streeteasy.com/sale/1520678

Is Streeteasy a good site to use to browse Brooklyn listings? Including Bay Ridge and other further away from Manhattan areas?

How about this one: https://streeteasy.com/sale/1560218
$3M unit with $433 taxes per month (0.2% rate)?!?!?!?!

Streeteasy is absolutely the best site for Brownstone Brooklyn/Williamsburg/Downtown.

For South Brooklyn, you're probably better off with Zillow.

Krolik, 1-3 family is a separate tax category with a different real estate tax calculation and 20% tax increase cap every 5 years. You can find some examples of low taxes in Manhattan as well relative to market value. I am comparing coops to coops.

Keith, I know that one!! Nicely re-renovated as well. I wouldn't have thought apartments in that location sell for more price per sq ft than MIdtown east but they do now.

Brooklyn still throw out a lot of heat:

"The total of the asking prices for last week’s deals was $80.4 million. The median asking price for those units was $2.5 million, and the average price per square foot was $1,363."

https://therealdeal.com/2021/11/01/condo-with-20-foot-ceilings-tops-brooklyns-luxury-home-deals/

What's new development-wise that's undervalued ?

I think OLR/RLS might be better than Zillow for Bay Ridge, though when I last put buyers in Bay Ridge I used both.

"The median asking price for those units was $2.5 million, and the average price per square foot was $1,363."

this cannot be right... I paid less than that per foot in Manhattan.... how is this an average in Brooklyn?

I believe they are referencing homes that were over $2 million dollars and condos. Manhattan doesn't command a premium across the board as it used to versus Brooklyn. There are a number of Brooklyn new developments, trading in the 1500 to 1700 per square foot range.

In fact, many areas on Brooklyn (leaving aside Park Slope, Dumbo, Brooklyn Heights) are more expensive than non prime areas of Manhattan such as Midtown East, West and Fidi. BK taxes/cc/maintenance are a lot lower.

Believe it or not, some condos are 25c per sq ft per month taxes unabated in BK. CC for the same level of service is also cheaper by 25% at least. I think I had Schumer's coop building as an example of much lower Maintenance per sq ft vs similar Manhattan coop for a high level of service in a prime BK location. On an NPV basis using 3% cap rate, lower carrying in BK work out to 20%+ of purchase price (leaving aside new high-end developments in BK). And probably 30%+ value of BK townhouses is due to low taxes (10-20k in prime park slope vs $50-150k in Manhattan).

https://news.bloombergtax.com/daily-tax-report-state/nycs-adams-pledges-to-fix-property-tax-inequities-in-first-year

Every mayor pretends to do a Big Bang but nothing actually happens. I think Adams will have his hands full with public safety and improving schools and he is not really going to increase taxes on his constituents in BK.

Doesn't he own, live in a Brownstone in Brooklyn?

Indeed. In Bed Stuy. So I only expect some minor adjustments. Probably in $5mm plus condos. Perhaps an additional transaction tax going to the city.

City can easily change the transfer tax without touching the real estate tax system.

I am sure the transfer tax is not the part of tax system that everyone thinks is messed up.

Adams is on record saying he wants to soak Manhattan residents further for property taxes.

Adams' position stated above seems accurate based on this: https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/nyc-elections-2021/ny-nyc-property-taxes-reform-de-blasio-yang-adams-stringer-wiley-garcia-20210412-s7rtvp22ojhqvgewhu3hso7kqu-story.html

By the way, mortgage recording tax seems to be "unfairly" disadvantaging the less affluent persons who are more likely to need a mortgage, so unless there is something I am missing, this is tax that could be reformed and perhaps replaced with some form of a pied-a-terre tax to replace revenue?

As far as I can tell New York State legislature is looking to extend mortgage recording tax (mezzanine loans, preferred equity, etc) not reduce it.

Streeteasy may be fun for a little water cooler talk, however, I would suggest subscribing to Jonathan Miller's housing notes for consistent, data-driven information about the market. Some very interesting insights into the New York City market as well as other markets throughout the United States in this particular one;

https://www.millersamuel.com/note/november-5-2021/

Some more great insight and data from Urbandigs. Along with some informative charts showing short-term price action across property types along with long-term appreciation (10 yr.) across various property types. Who do you think did better, condos, co-ops, or townhouses?

We're off to Europe for a couple of weeks to visit friends and family and do some skiing
( as long as we get a clean PCR test on Friday. Wish us luck!) Merry Christmas! A belated happy Hanukkah!

https://youtu.be/LTCISyzDQ3k

So glad I got to see you early this year. Merry Xmas and Happy New Year!

ali r.

Best thing to do is BUY in a crummy neighborhood with high crime
Prices always go up

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

See you next year!

Do I hear hooves?

Even new development has price increase on the low floor.

https://streeteasy.com/building/saint-marks-place/301