While Fort Greene is generating headlines for new condo towers including the Forté, a 30-story tower on Ashland Place; 85 Flatbush Avenue, designed by Ismael Leyva; and Rockwell Place, a converted piano factory, many of those looking to make the Brooklyn neighborhood home cite the attraction of the area’s historic housing stock.
On a recent Saturday, a number of potential buyers browsed brownstones, which are concentrated in the heart of the neighborhood directly south of Fort Greene Park.
An open house in a renovated, turn-of-the-century brownstone saw a steady stream of interested buyers touring its four vacant (and slightly unfinished) condo units. The units in the brownstone, at 10 South Oxford Street, ranged from a 1,950-square-foot, first-level duplex for $1.55 million to a 950-square-foot, top-level one-bedroom for $750,000.
“The area has great inventory,” Corcoran broker Abdul Muid said from his office on Lafayette Avenue. “If you find a prewar home that’s intact with all its details, that’s going to be a great buy.”
Those browsing at 10 South Oxford cited the building’s pre-war charm as on the top of their priority lists.
“I prefer a place with character,” said Dave Zweig, 33, a Manhattan broker visiting, on this day, as an ordinary customer with his fiancée. Zweig praised the quality of the renovation and said, “Sometimes you see these renovated places, and it’s so cheap.”
Zweig said that while he had looked at a place on Eastern Parkway closer to Crown Heights, he wasn’t sure he liked that area as much, and Fort Greene was the best match for his price range. He said he and his fiancée currently rent, and that it will make more sense for them financially to buy once they are married.
Also at the open house were Matt and Amanda Lipstein, ages 33 and 34, respectively, who were looking to upgrade from the 400-square-foot Lower East Side studio they have been living in since they married a year ago. “We like the small number of units,” Matt Lipstein said. “Some of the new places we’ve seen have a hotel feeling.”
The high concentration of properties with historic character seems to be helping Fort Greene stave off a real estate downturn. Muid estimated that prices have increased 4 to 7 percent in the past year.
According to statistics released by the Corcoran Group last month, average prices in Brooklyn overall rose by about 8 percent from 2006 to 2007. Meanwhile, according to the real estate appraisal firm Miller Samuel, average prices in Manhattan rose 10.8 percent over the same year.
Corcoran found that the average price increases varied among Brooklyn neighborhoods, but that the median price of a co-op jumped 5 percent in Fort Greene and neighboring Clinton Hill, while condos increased 4 percent.
The general concerns about the real estate market seem to have taken a bite out of the number of potential buyers out apartment-hunting in Fort Greene, but there are still plenty of people looking, brokers said.
“Whereas before we might have had 10 buyers for a property, now we have three or four,” said Karen Talbott, who was showing a five-story, three-family brownstone at 32 St. James Place. The asking price was $2.13 million.
Because of cold weather, some brokers said traffic was slower than usual on this particular weekend.
Most people who shop for $2 million homes don’t have a problem with loans, Talbott noted. “They pay a million cash and finance the rest.” She said the “old-world charm” of a Brooklyn brownstone makes Fort Greene popular among dollar-rich Europeans. “They’ll call and ask about Fort Greene or Clinton Hill specifically,” she said.
The St. James Place brownstone features many of the decorative accents that make older units across the neighborhood so desired. It has splashes of exposed brick; original fireplaces with mantles of white marble and dark, columned wood; an arched storage alcove off the bedroom; and a textured wall in the basement that appeared to be pressed tin.
Many of those milling through recent open houses in the neighborhoods said they were looking for an upgrade—either from renting to buying, or from a one-bedroom to a two-bedroom.
At an open house at 72 South Portland Street, Jenny Bent was contemplating making an offer on a ground-level, 900-square-foot one-bedroom unit with a 1,300-square-foot private garden in back.
“I’m priced out of Park Slope,” said Bent, who was pushing a stroller as she was walking through the unit. “This unit was listed for $645,000.”
Commercial real estate agent Buster Black, 29, was also intrigued. He has lived in Fort Greene for two and a half years and is now looking to buy a larger place. “I’m not actively looking in any other neighborhoods,” he said.
Hanging on the wall of this co-op was an indication of what might inspire such fierce loyalty to the neighborhood. It was a framed enlargement of a 2006 Time Out New York article that had named that particular block of South Portland as the best block in the city.
Corcoran agent Rudy Lucchese, who was showing the property, said South Oxford and South Portland have always been neighborhood favorites.
He shrugged off any suggestion that economic or real estate woes might slow Fort Greene’s transformation. “There is still a lot of demand for Brooklyn,” Lucchese said, “and this neighborhood is thriving.”
Like other gentrified sections of Brooklyn, Fort Greene has long been attracting Manhattanites who appreciate the upscale restaurants, shopping and neighborhood amenities, especially along DeKalb Avenue and around the triangular island where Fulton Street meets Lafayette Avenue. Also, the neighborhood is getting more upscale by the day. Just last month, Union Market, a high-end grocery, confirmed its plans to open a third outpost on the corner of Fulton and Rockwell Place.
Brokers estimated that 50 to 75 percent of their buyers, often young families or couples, are relocating from Manhattan. At Rockwell Place, 19 of 36 condo loft conversions have been sold, and sales manager Marco Auteri said a “good majority” of his prospective clients come from the city.
Many of them, Auteri said, mention the Brooklyn Academy of Music and nearby cultural attractions as a reason they like the neighborhood. A poster in his sales office illustrates the planned expansion of BAM’s cultural space, including a $35 million Frank Gehry-designed theater that many predict will transform the area even further.