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Blocks around Ground Zero see a condo and rental rebirth

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The blocks around Ground Zero seem to have shaken off the residential doldrums that understandably shrouded them the last four years, and are seeing a wave of fresh condo development and brisk rental leasing. At least seven condo developments and four rentals are either planned or recently completed in the area bordered by Barclay Street on the north, Battery Place on the south, Broadway on the east, and West Street to the west.

Despite the renewed vibrancy, residential prices around Ground Zero still generally lag those of housing farther north, leading brokers to hedge that the area’s best days are ahead of it rather than here already.

“I personally call it the future, OK,” said Lisa Maysonet, a top producer with Prudential Douglas Elliman who has brokered in the area. “I say ‘future’ because I think that out of all the areas of Manhattan this has the greatest potential for future appreciation. All the plans for down by Ground Zero are going to be awesome. In every problem, see, there’s going to be an opportunity.”

The plans for around Ground Zero include the space set aside for memorializing September 11, a 6.5-acre block bounded by Fulton, Greenwich, Liberty and West streets. Goldman Sachs is planning a 43-story headquarters across the street from Ground Zero and nearby is 7 World Trade Center, which should open early next year. The $8 million renovation of Liberty Plaza Park is scheduled to be completed by summer 2006, adding 33,000 square feet of public space. Also, construction started in September on transportation hubs at Fulton Street and the World Trade Center site. And government officials in early October announced plans for at least 200,000 square feet of new retail space along the Church Street concourse.

“Down there,” Maysonet said, “it’s going to be really cool when everything finally comes to fruition.”

When and if everything does, the condos and the rentals should be there for hundreds of the area’s newest residents (see map and chart at bottom).

Condo projects in the pipeline, under construction, or recently completed, according to analysis of data from the state Attorney General’s office, include the 30-story, 153-unit tower at 133-135 Greenwich Street; the 146-unit Greenwich Place Condo at 120 Greenwich Street; the Millennium Tower Residences at 30 West Street, with 237 units; the 450-unit 88 Greenwich Street, currently a rental; a hotel-condo at 4 Albany Street; 111 Washington Street, about 40 stories of luxury condos; and 18 West Street, which started development as a 386-unit rental.

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Rentals, too, dot the Ground Zero landscape. Brokers say the area attracts younger people who add a certain vitality to an area that even before September 11 was notorious for shutting down after the evening rush hour. A 56-story, 381-unit rental at 10 Barclay is expected to be completed in early 2006. It would join the 400-unit, 27-story 90 Washington Street, which came on the market in 2004. The newest rental in the area is 90 West Street. Originally an early 20th-century office building, it underwent a renovation that yielded 410 units.

Studios at 90 West are going for $1,600 to $2,000 a month and one-bedrooms go as high as $4,000, depending on the size, according to Clifford Finn, on-site marketing director at Citi Habitats Marketing Group. Finn said Citi Habitats rented 400 units there in five months. The rental market in the area, he said, is “very strong right now, very tight inventory.”

Finn said he finds young renters want amenities like a doorman and an in-building gym and they crave being a part of below-14th Street nightlife but they don’t want to pay too much.

“It’s a more attractive price point for a younger person who wants to be Downtown,” Finn said. “Tribeca, Soho and the West Village are extremely expensive.”

Sales, too, reflect this geographical divide.

Maysonet said for-sale properties around Ground Zero are selling for 30 to 40 percent less, generally, than if they were a few blocks north in Tribeca. She has been trying to sell Def Jam Records founder Russell Simmons’ 7,000-square-foot condo on Liberty Street, which includes a 4,000-square-foot terrace. It’s listed at $10 million, and remains stubbornly on the market as of mid-October.

“If it were in Tribeca,” Maysonet said, “we’d have been out of there.”

Go to map and chart

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