From left: Thor Equities CEO Joseph Sitt; Brian Hanson, director of sales, Massey Knakal; Juan Rivero, spokesman, Save Coney Island; Timothy King, managing partner, CPEX Real Estate; Albert Wilk, owner/broker, Wilk Real Estate; Sofia Song, vice president, research, StreetEasy
The last two years have, of course, brought Coney Island back from the dead with its first new amusement parks in a half-century — Luna Park and the Scream Zone. So what’s the status of the rest of the redevelopment of Coney Island? Is it on the same Cyclone-style roller coaster as the rest of the city’s real estate market?
In this month’s Q&A, The Real Deal talked to a host of Coney Island’s players, including the commercial brokers who do deals in the area, the city officials pushing forward the remainder of the redevelopment, advocates looking to preserve the neighborhood’s character, and residential brokers who are seeing the demand for housing change. And, of course, we talked to Coney Island’s most prolific developer, Joseph Sitt, whose name and company, Thor Equities, are never far from anyone’s lips when they’re talking about Coney Island.
What we found was a cross section of views of what’s happening in the area, which is still expecting up to 5,000 new units of housing and 500,000 square feet of new retail.
On the commercial side, retail rents are up about 10 to 15 percent compared to before the 2009 rezoning, and buildings are getting sold. But at least one of our sources said the recession has slowed down progress. [more]
