From left: Owner Volker Herrmann and the sites of his bakeries at the base of 185 Orchard Street (gray building at right) and 137 Seventh Avenue South

A German bakery selling wursts, soups, salads and baked goods, which was originally slated to open two New York locations last fall, is finally moving ahead with its plans, Volker Herrmann, owner of the bakery, Landbrot, told The Real Deal.

Landbrot, which was founded by German telecommunications execs David Rothe and Hermann, will open the eateries, at 137 Seventh Avenue South in the West Village and 185 Orchard Street on the Lower East Side, both in late March, Herrmann predicted, though no dates have been pin-pointed so far. The latter space, which is at the base of the Thompson LES Hotel, has been vacant since the completion of the hotel in 2008. Rothe will permanently move to New York city to oversee the operation of the stores. [more]

Linda Salamon of Roslyn, L.I., nabbed one of the recession’s sweeter real estate deals when she bought a $400,000 Lower East Side co-op at 413 Grand Street for $33,000 last May, the Daily News reported. Alas, the Seward Park Co-op board revoked her sale three months later, saying the sale, by auction, ignored the board’s right of first refusal.

Salamon is suing the co-op and Chase Home Finance, which put the apartment on the block after the current occupant defaulted on a $349,600 loan.

[more]

The young, artistic populace that is the precursor to gentrification has descended upon one of the last corners of Downtown Manhattan yet to be inundated with glassy new development.

According to the Wall Street Journal, cheap rents have brought an artistic community to the area known as Two Bridges, in eastern Chinatown south of East Broadway, which new residents have begun to dub “Chumbo” — a combination of Chinatown and the upscale Brooklyn neighborhood that sits directly across the East River. At least one resident interviewed by the Journal called it “the last cool neighborhood on the island.” [more]

Once known as the “lighting district,” the stretch of Bowery south of Houston Street is losing the shops that contibruted to that nickname. The Wall Street Journal reported that since 2000 the area has dropped one-third of its light fixture businesses — bringing the total to 20, and two more are set to close — while rents have more than doubled from between $30 to $50 per square foot to about $100 in 2011.

Like similar “districts” on the Lower East Side, including the restaurant supply businesses that lined the sidewalks between East Houston and Delancey streets, glassy new development has pushed out iconic shopping areas. And at the market’s peak many developers simply made offers to acquire real estate that lighting store owners couldn’t refuse. [more]

New York City’s affordable housing crisis can be linked to a pandemic of predatory equity investors in the region, according to a recent report (see full report after the jump) compiled by the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development, a non-profit advocacy organization. These investors have snatched up around 100,000 units of affordable or rent-regulated housing in the past four years, a figure that represents around 10 percent of the affordable or rent-regulated housing in the city, bringing with them pressure to turn over profits on the buildings — sometimes by as much as a 14 to 20 percent annual rate of return, the report says. Additionally, the report found that many of these equity loans earn just 55 cents on each dollar of debt, a level which is considered predatory, Crain’s reported. Much like Tishman Speyer, the developer at Stuyvesant Town that recently lost a landmark deregulation case, these private investors often try illegal deregulation tactics, and sometimes even intimidation, to drive out tenants. “Neighborhoods around New York City have seen a dramatic rise in the harassment of tenants as landlords tried to illegally remove low- and moderate-income families so they could raise the rent,” the report says. “This increase in harassment stemmed in large part from the rise of a new type of buyer of New York City real estate.” The report named 11 neighborhoods in the city, including the Lower East Side, North-Central Bronx and Washington Heights, as particular breeding grounds for predatory equity deals on affordable housing. TRD [more]

In keeping with seasonal trends, rental demand in Manhattan has
increased week-over-week since the beginning of April and since last
year, according to a May rental market report from the Real Estate
Group New York. Rental deals increased 33 percent this April compared
to April of 2008. But rents are still down significantly from their
2007 numbers, the report said. “While we have seen some owners realize the increase in demand and
begin to test the market, we are concerned that, as what happened last
summer, owners that are too aggressive to raise prices or slash
incentives will find themselves holding excess inventory going into the
fall,” Daniel Baum, COO of the Real Estate Group, said in the report. TRD [more]

Renters in the outer boroughs who were previously priced out of
Manhattan are moving back as prices fall. For just $100 more a month, a
publicist left his Greenpoint apartment for a Lower East Side unit
(although it is half the size of his old Brooklyn home), and an editor
left Sunset Park for Midtown, receiving a month of free rent. In the
first three months of the year, one-bedroom rents in Manhattan fell 6.7
percent compared to the previous year, while Brooklyn one-bedrooms saw
rents drop 3.2 percent, according to Citi Habitats and Ideal Properties
Group. Only 9 percent of renters moving to Brooklyn were from Manhattan
during the first three months of the year, while nearly a quarter of
renters migrated from Manhattan to Brooklyn during the same time last
year, according to Ideal.
[more]