Creative Real Estate Group founder Chris Havens and Dumbo
As Brooklyn’s thriving tech scene pushes Dumbo’s office vacancy rate below 2 percent, local community groups are trying to plot the industry’s expansion beyond the neighborhood but within the borough. Brooklyn Paper reported the Dumbo Improvement District, Brooklyn Navy and Downtown Brooklyn Partnership have created a task force aimed at making Downtown Brooklyn the destination for startups that can’t find space in Dumbo. [more]
The announcement earlier this month from Massey Knakal Realty Services that it was entering
the retail leasing business brought not only a major new competitor
to New York City store rentals, but also introduced a novel
brokerage model to the notoriously fractured industry. The 22-year-old firm has grown to be one of the largest investment sales companies in the city
relying on a system that divides the New York metro area into nearly 50 geographic territories
and assigns a broker to each one. It is believed to be the only firm to use a territory system for
retail brokerage. [more]
Downtown Brooklyn office real estate is suffering, according to Crain’s, with just three deals inked last year for 30,000 square feet of space or more. With lowered Manhattan rents putting up a fight and tenants looking to streamline their space, the Downtown Brooklyn market is hurting — and it’s tough to tell when it might rebound, according to Chris Havens, CEO of Creative Real Estate Group in Brooklyn. “The market is a mixed picture, with a vacancy rate that is lower than almost any major office market in America, but it’s a very slow-moving market,” Havens said.
From the November issue: Like many other development firms, the Clarett Group rode the wave of
the real estate boom expertly, building successful condos in Manhattan
and other markets across the country. Like a host of other developers,
however, the company hit a damaging riptide in Downtown Brooklyn. A few
months ago, Clarett’s condo, the Forté, went back to its lender,
Eurohypo AG. The move was the most boldface example thus far of the
difficulties developers have encountered selling condos in Downtown
Brooklyn, generally defined as the section of the borough bounded by
Nassau Street to the north, Ashland Place to the east, Schermerhorn
Street to the south and Court Street to the west. That catch zone
encompasses several micro-neighborhoods, including the western edge of
Fort Greene. Several big developers are feeling pain in the saturated
area, which has been generating a lot of attention lately because three
new luxury rental towers are preparing to launch. [more]
