Greenpoint Developers Bet on Condos

When Ryan Serhant began selling condos in Greenpoint, it was relatively untapped by new construction buyers.

His first project in the neighborhood was 160 West Street, a boutique condo built in 2016. At the time, the neighborhood was largely dominated by townhouses, rentals and small condo developments.

“Greenpoint was known for a bar that Bill Murray would go to,” Serhant said. But for buyers looking to purchase in new, fully amenitized buildings, the neighborhood “wasn’t on everyone’s map yet.”

Since then, a slew of development has transformed its waterfront. Greenpoint Landing, the 22-acre mixed-use project and park lining the East River, debuted in 2018 along with a 328-unit condo tower known as The Greenpoint.

The latest addition to the neighborhood’s growing condo collection is The Huron, a 171-unit property developed by UK-based Quadrum Global and designed by Morris Adjmi.

Serhant’s new-development arm launched listings at the two-tower building this week, though the firm’s been marketing the building in a whisper campaign that began last September, when the broker announced The Huron’s arrival on a packed East River cruise.

Since then, the team claims it has locked down buyers for more than $100 million in sales — which shakes out to $2,100 per square foot if they close for the contracted prices — at the building, where they’ve raised prices multiple times to keep up with demand.

The team declined to share how many of the building’s units are in contract.

The first finished residence is a corner unit with waterfront views asking $3.25 million. Listings on StreetEasy range from $750,000 for a studio to $3.2 million for a three-bedroom.

While Serhant said he attributes the sales progress, in part, to the building’s features and his marketing strategy, he acknowledged that the location is of significant interest to buyers.

“You still look around a lot in New York, and you can see a lot of retail signs, vacant spaces and empty offices,” Serhant said. “You go to Greenpoint, and it’s like, ‘Oh, this is where everybody went.’”

In the last two years, more than 60 restaurants, bars and coffee shops have opened in the neighborhood, and Greenpoint Avenue, its main restaurant thoroughfare, doesn’t have any vacancies, according to Serhant’s team.

The growth isn’t limited to retail space. Last year, developers filed 230 condo plans in Greenpoint, more than any other neighborhood in the borough by at least 100, according to an analysis by The Real Deal. The number of plans submitted last year were the most filed in Greenpoint since 2010.

Developers have begun shifting to condos because of the expiration of rental project tax break 421a, according to Serhant. The shift is perhaps more noticeable in a neighborhood like Greenpoint, where a lot of the large-scale development has historically been rentals.

Most of the residential space lining Greenpoint Landing are rental buildings, including The Bell Slip, One Blue Slip and Two Blue Slip which total nearly 1,200 units. Eagle + West, on the opposite side of Greenpoint Playground, has 745 units.

Greenpoint’s median rent is $4,525, according to data from RentHop. Studios in the neighborhood go for an average of $3,600 per month, compared with $2,600 in November 2018. Four-bedrooms are nearly $6,500, versus $4,300 five years ago.

Rents in Greenpoint are also outpacing those in several other popular Brooklyn neighborhoods. In July, the average rent for all apartments in Greenpoint was $4,800 per month, more than $400 higher than that of Boerum Hill, Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill, according to RentCafe.

On the sales side, the average condo deal in Greenpoint has increased over the last five years — up more than 7 percent from 2018, according to TRD’s analysis. However, the growth isn’t as high as in some enclaves of Williamsburg, like in the East and the South where prices have increased 42 percent and 29 percent, respectively.

But Greenpoint is catching up to Williamsburg. The average sale price of a condo is $1.5 million across Williamsburg and $1.3 million in Greenpoint.

“We’ve sold a lot of properties in Greenpoint to people who had no intention whatsoever of looking at Greenpoint,” said Christine Blackburn, who co-leads Compass’ Barak Blackburn focused on Brooklyn deals.

While the neighborhood has long been considered a plan B for would-be Williamsburg buyers, Greenpoint has become more attractive to buyers, especially as branded stores like Chanel and J. Crew take over retail space and draw crowds in Williamsburg, Blackburn said.

“We’re definitely finding higher-end buyers that are a little bit more tuned in to Greenpoint’s kind of charm,” she added.

In the past, Greenpoint was notorious for its long commute from Manhattan via the G train, Blackburn said. However, the MTA has “drastically improved” the subway line in the past five years, which has eased some buyers’ concerns about the neighborhood.

The shift to remote work has also bolstered demand in Greenpoint, according to Compass’ Jennifer Lafferty, a Brooklyn broker on Vickey Barron’s team.

“The commute into Greenpoint used to be challenging and that affected property values,” Lafferty said. “Now, for the profile of people that are in Greenpoint, the commutes are irrelevant.”