Brutal web comments create new level of accountability, prompting changes to listings and projects

From the September issue: Last month, Prudential Douglas Elliman agent Ellen Rick got an unexpected e-mail.

“A very nice young man e-mailed me and said, ‘I wanted you to know that you’re being trashed on StreetEasy,’” Rick recalled. Unbeknownst to her, a StreetEasy.com user had created an online discussion board entitled “Deception by Elliman broker, Ellen Rick.”

The comments pointed out that two of Rick’s listings at 30 Fifth Avenue — units 4A and 10H — displayed the same photos. StreetEasy users thought she was trying to pull the wool over their eyes, but Rick said the photographer that shot 10H had mistakenly loaded the photos for 4A as well. She immediately called the photographer to fix the snafu.

“I’m glad that somebody made me aware of that, and I corrected it,” she said, adding that the incident has made her more vigilant about problems with her listings.

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Is the real estate downturn over already? Some brokers are suggesting exactly that — for New York City at least. Brokers
are reporting that contract signings and closings are picking up, in a
decided change from this past winter’s near total lack of activity.
While that market is nowhere near the stratospheric highs of 2007 and
2008, some are predicting that the worst of the downturn has passed. “I
think we bottomed out a few months back, maybe January or February,”
said Richard Hamilton, a senior vice president at Halstead Property,
who said he recently closed on a one-bedroom with a terrace for
$515,000, as well as a 1,600-square-foot apartment in Prospect Heights
– with competing bids — for $800,000. [more]