Aerial view of Brooklyn

Brooklyn rents grew at an average rate of nearly 6.58 percent last year, compared with 0.37 percent in 2010, according to MNS’ first annual Brooklyn Rental Market Report for the year. One-bedroom average rents saw the largest increase, at 9.59 percent, while studios had the most modest gains at 4.13 percent.

Average rental prices for Brooklyn studios have increased by only $47 per month from August 2009 to December 2011, and remain firm around $1,700 per month, the report says. But overall 2011 showed very steady growth in Brooklyn, with December 2011 showing the highest average rental prices in the borough since MNS began keeping track, in August 2009. [more]

From left: Prudential Douglas Elliman’s Jessica Peters and Stephanie O’Brien and the exterior and interior of the Plex

A 98-unit luxury rental building — one of the first of its kind — is set to open in southern Crown Heights, signaling what could be a new era for real estate in the Brooklyn neighborhood.

Within three weeks, developer Nostrand Group LLC plans to start leasing at the Plex, located at 301 Sullivan Place on the corner of Nostrand Avenue. Monthly rents at the Plex (short for “complex”) will range from $1,350 for a studio to $2,800 for a 1,100-square foot three-bedroom, according to Prudential Douglas Elliman’s Jessica Peters, who is handling rentals at the project with colleague Stephanie O’Brien.

Designed by prolific architect Karl Fischer with interiors by Hadas Metzler, the seven-story building features an attended lobby with a concierge, a garage, two landscaped terraces, a residents’ lounge with a billiards table, a movie screening room, a refrigerated Fresh Direct storage room and a 1,500-square-foot fitness center with a separate yoga room. [more]

Corcoran’s Pamela Liebman, map of disputed Brooklyn area (Bedford Avenue circled) and Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries

Residential real estate giant the Corcoran Group has been commended by King’s County Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries for correcting its advertising practices. Corcoran, Jeffries said in today’s statement, had been falsely stating the boundary between Prospect Heights and Crown Heights in an effort to market Crown Heights’ properties as being in the more desirable Prospect Heights neighborhood.

Jeffries’ office said the assemblyman contacted Corcoran CEO Pamela Liebman April 25 about the practice, citing a New York State Real Property Law that allows the Secretary of State to sanction a real estate broker “if such licensee has been guilty of fraud or fraudulent practices, or for dishonest or misleading advertising, or had demonstrated untrustworthiness or incompetency to act as a real estate broker or salesman,” the law states. [more]

A new Best Western hotel has opened in Crown Heights, according to Brownstoner, at 1324 Atlantic Avenue near the corner of Nostrand Avenue. The hotel will include 56 rooms, a fitness center and free parking for guests. Rates begin at $159.99 per night. In October of last year it was announced that another Best Western location would soon open in Downtown Brooklyn. [Brownstoner]

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Laurence Gluck, a low- and middle-income housing landlord widely scorned for his handling of the Riverton Houses complex in Harlem, could emerge from his semi-pariah status, according to the New York Times, as city and federal officials scramble to find an owner for the Tivoli Towers residential building in Crown Heights. Gluck, who had once angled for ownership of the 33-story affordable housing development, only to be thwarted by city officials, is in talks to buy the building for $11.25 million. The deal comes with a couple caveats: he has to complete approximately $15 million worth of needed renovations and pledge to keep the building affordable for the next 30 years. But while Gluck might be an appealing option for officials, Tivoli tenants express trepidation. “There are great concerns about Laurence Gluck taking over this property,” Alice Mitchell, a tenant at Tivoli, said. “It seems he’s a predatory developer.” Dina Levy, a director with the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board, described the scenario as somewhat of a Faustian bargain for residents. “They have to make a choice between getting desperately needed repairs and taking their chances living under Larry Gluck,” Levy said, “or fighting the deal and risking that the building sits in limbo, with no repairs getting done.”

Trout restaurant

Three restaurants started by Brooklyn’s most prolific restaurateur, Jim Mamary, and one of his partners, Richard Krause, were abruptly closed last week with no warning to employees. And another of their Brooklyn eateries, the troubled seafood spot Trout, is unlikely to reopen after it shuttered early this fall due to slow business.

Employees at Fly Fish in Prospect-Lefferts Gardens and Bueno in Boerum Hill said they were stunned to hear at staff meetings Dec. 1 that the shift would be their last.

Bueno, a European bistro that Krause opened three months ago at the intersection of Smith and Pacific Streets, is part of a complex that also included Trout, Since 1963, also closed last week, and Pacifico. Pacifico, a Mexican cantina that Mamary no longer owns a stake in, will remain open.

“They said they needed to pull in $17,000 by week’s end and they were only pulling in $13,000,” said an employee at Bueno, who requested anonymity. “Now I’m back to square one, looking for a job on the holidays.” [more]

Nearly 1,000 moderately priced homes and apartments are now available for purchase in the city through the Housing Partnership Development Corp., a non-profit that works to create new affordable housing with the help of government grants, subsidies and tax credits. Of those, 700 are located in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights and East New York neighborhoods and are priced up to 35 percent below market values. In the Bergen Street Co-ops, at 1509 Bergen Street in Crown Heights, Brooklyn families meeting a minimum income requirement of $54,000 per year can apply to purchase one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments, priced between $179,190 and $350,000. Homes like these are built with the help of government grants, subsidies and tax credits, which the Housing Partnership works to make available to developers selected by the city. Recently, funds were approved for the 104-unit Sterling Street Co-ops conversion, another of the organization’s projects, at 320 Sterling Street in Crown Heights. Construction on the project is 75 percent complete. In the Bronx, there are 200 affordable units currently available, and there are 75 in Queens. [Brooklyn Eagle via Curbed]
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Sixty-five newly developed condos in some of Brooklyn’s most popular neighborhoods are either in distress or close to it, according to a report from Democratic Assembly member Hakeem Jeffries’ office. The troubled properties run the gamut, from completed properties to ones still under construction or stalled. Jeffries studied the five neighborhoods in his district, Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, Prospect Heights, Crown Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant, in an effort to advocate for enhanced affordable housing in his district. “There was an irrational exuberance of construction in the area these past few years,” Jeffries said, in reference to the glut of new properties in the borough.

From the May issue: Crown Heights, a multicultural Brooklyn
neighborhood with stunning architecture but a troubled history, is
showing the impact of the recession in stalled residential sales,
boarded-up homes and commercial vacancies popping up with increasing
frequency in recent months. While the area continues to beckon bargain
hunters eager for deals on brownstones, many of those would-be buyers
now struggle to get mortgages. In the first quarter of this year, the
total number of sales for houses, co-ops and condominiums in Crown
Heights dropped to 40, compared to 75 sales for the same period in
2008, according to data from Streeteasy.com. The average price for a
Crown Heights home dropped nearly 27 percent, from $493,700 in the
first quarter of last year, to $363,114 in the first quarter of 2009. [more]