Karen Heyman and Alan Heyman, Sotheby’s International Realty
From the July issue: The business of selling Brooklyn real estate has changed drastically in recent years. When Brooklyn native Karen Heyman first started selling Dumbo lofts in the 1990s, Manhattan residents refused to take the subway there. “I used to have to send my driver over the bridge to pick people up,” recalled Heyman, now a senior vice president at Sotheby’s International Realty. Today, “those same people are now on their third or fourth Dumbo apartment.” Brooklyn brokers have seen their business (and wallets) expand exponentially over the past decade, as a trickle, and then a flood, of resettling Manhattanites ventured across the East River. In particular, agents have benefited hugely from the condo boom of the mid-2000s, which greatly upped Brooklyn sales prices (downturn notwithstanding). [more]
