Jun. 25, 2010 - loft law extension / what's the big deal? UPDATED w maps

passed!
Of course I have been following the reports over the last week about the "extension" bill just passed (and to-be-immediately-amended) New York State Loft Law. But it has been very difficult to understand what is really been at stake here.

Short story: it seems to have little to do with Manhattan (with one important caveat) and is a big deal in Brooklyn and Queens, and among fans of industry. As always with our dysfunctional state government, there are some fascinating sidelights about politics and (bad) process.

facts
Not a lot of factual detail in the news reports. Crain's had a fairly comprehensive factual treatment, posted on-line on Tuesday afternoon. If there has been a 'real' article in the NY Times about the law, I missed it; the City Blog ran a short Christine Haughney entry on Tuesday about the bill signing Monday night. The best treatment I've seen is from a blogger in Bushwick, Brooklyn,  BushwickBK.com (here, here, and here); indeed, that blog has been covering this story for a while.

I tracked down a copy of the bill in the form in which I think it was passed, here.

From a big picture perspective, the big change for Manhattan lofts already covered by the 1982 Loft Law is that the law is now permanent, instead of having to have been periodically renewed. For Queens and (especially) Brooklyn, the big change is a change in the geography covered by the Loft Law.

mechanics
The law applies to buildings, not tenants (I will explain), requires landlords in those buildings to bring the residential space in the buildings up to code (eventually) and would give residential tenants in those buildings rent stabilization guidelines rights. Much as the original Loft Law in 1982 changed the legal framework within which to look at already existing residential use in areas that are formally (and were formerly) industrial, the extension of the loft law recognizes new realities on the ground.

The law applies to buildings in which at least two families living for at least 12 consecutive months in the 24 months of 2008 and 2009 (reports say that "two" will be amended to "three" families as the trigger for coverage). [UPDATE:  a private comment confirms that the amendment to re-set the 'trigger' from 2 to 3 families is in a bill to be voted on by the Assembly on June 28; thx Reader Maria]

Owners of buildings with qualifying tenants (all of whom, presumably, know that they have been illegally been renting to households, presumably because they can get higher rents) must apply for an "alteration permit" (to bring the building up to residential Building Code standards, it appears) within 9 months and achieve compliance within 18 months after obtaining that permit, and take steps to get a residential Certificate of Occupancy within 3 years of bill being law (subject to applying for two one-year waivers).

I don't see it, but somewhere in all the cross-referencing sections must be the provision that loft tenants subject to the amended law will be subject to (protected by) rent stabilization.

I don't see it, but somewhere in all the cross-referencing sections must be a provision that expands the geographic scope of the Loft Law from the few original Manhattan neighborhoods. Nothing I have read is explicit about this, but I gather that the new law applies city-wide except for some areas to be carved out of the law because they are Industrial Business Zones.  Apparently, The Fight has been about those IBZs.

geography, the Ins and Outs
That's what i infer from a letter that Mayor Bloomberg wrote in opposition to the law this past Monday, quoted in The Observer:

While the original 1982 Loft Law was explicitly limited in geographic scope, the new law seems to default for coverage unless an area is specifically excluded. Two local members of Congress and two City Council Members made a similar argument to the Mayor in their letter to the Governor (h/t to The Observer for the link):

These elected officials go on to argue that the bill rewards cheating landlords, who flouted the law (and public safety) by permitting families to live in buildings that did not meet Building Code standards for residential use and who reaped the financial rewards that higher residential leases permitted.

This legislation would give a large windfall to building owners who knowingly rented out space to residential tenants in violation of the City’s zoning laws. We call your attention to a 2004 report, “Illegal Residential Conversions in the East Williamsburg In-Place Industrial Park,” by the New York Industrial Retention Network, which describes how almost two dozen landlords converted a half-million square feet of industrial space to residential use without ever applying for a legal building permit.

I gather from comments on various articles and blogs that the cited report is somewhat controversial, but the competing perspectives are easy to understand.

fighting in the IBZ
As passed by the State Assembly and Senate, the loft law extension is city-wide, as I noted. Between passage and the deadline for the Governor to sign or veto the law (at midnight this past Monday), the backroom politicking has concerned the 16 IBZs, with tenant groups (and the bill sponsors) hoping for no exclusions (the full bill, as passed) and the Mayor (and others, as noted) arguing that the Governor should veto the bill unless it excluded all 16 IBZs. As noted in that Crain's article, at the end of the day (rather, at midnight on Monday) the deal is that 13 of 16 IBZs will be excluded form the bill, but that three large IBZs will be subject to the Loft Law.

big exclusions
I haven't yet found a map of the IBZs, but w[UPDATE: map links below] When everybody hunkered down the fight focused on five IBZs. Tenant interests were able to keep three large IBZs in the law (Greenpoint-Williamsburg, North Brooklyn and Maspeth, Queens) while Bloomberg and allies got an agreement to keep two other controversial IBZs out of the law (southwest Brooklyn, including Red Hook and Sunset Park, and Long Island City).

[UPDATE:  I did find maps of the IBZs, right where I should have looked from the start: NYC.gov. You will have to do some clicking to get each map, but they are very detailed, here. To Reader Maria: please call or email me about your research]

that handwriting on the wall? creeping loft-ism
If there are official estimates for how many buildings will soon be subject to the new-and-expanded Loft Law, I have not seen them. (This unattributed "fact" is reported in the Bushwick blog on Tuesday:  "The law will now cover tenants in about 3600 more units in around 300 buildings who can prove their tenancy for 12 months or more in 2008 and 2009.")

Formally, the law applies only to buildings that already meet this criteria:  buildings in which at least two families have been living for at least 12 consecutive months in the 24 months of 2008 and 2009 (reports say that "two" will be amended to "three" families as the trigger for coverage). Only those buildings, and only if they are outside of the surviving 13 IBZs.

But I gather that everyone assumes that, over time, these grandfathered and legal residences will inevitably spawn nearby illegal residential use, which will come to dominate some of these neighborhoods, as happened in Soho and Tribeca. When (if?) that happens, the facts on the ground will inevitably require the landlords to upgrade and/or the City to legalize additional buildings for residential use.

incompatibility
It is easy to caricature the arguments of the two sides to this dispute, and I have seen commentary that disparages comments such as this one from a Williamsburg-based food company, quoted in Crains:

For example, here is one guy commenting on that Bushwick blog (my bold on the Extra Silly):

There is a very interesting argument to be made here, and probably one that should be made on a very micro level. (More on that in a bit.) But as someone who lived in Tribeca beginning in 1980 and later on a very non-residential block on West 26 Street for 13 years, attitudes will change over time if these neighborhoods become more and more residential. First, the pioneers will be joined by newer residents, residents who may not appreciate as much grit as the pioneers. Second, the lifestyles of the pioneers may change, and they may be more concerned with noise, smells and dust after they buy a stroller (or a walker!).

Undeniably, this did happen in Tribeca. I can't help but think of the butter-and-egg guy I quoted in my March 12 retrospective post, Quote For The Day, 2000 edition, which referenced an old NY Times article:

Steven Wils also noticed the growing number of children in the neighborhood, but it made him anxious. He operated Harry Wils & Company on Duane Street, across from the park, with 18 trucks coming and going around the clock, laden with butter, eggs, cheese, olives, chocolate, spices and oils.

I remember trucks like those, which used to sit at loading docks almost blocking Duane Street just east of Greenwich. Even with Duane Street being very wide there, it took a lot of maneuvering to get those trailers to back on to those loading docks. Especially in the days before beep-beeping to warn of trucks in reverse, a distracted pedestrian (with or without toddler or stroller) would be at risk.

That Williamsburg food company won't have any additional problems, as there should not be additional residents moving in nearby (assuming they are in the Greenpoint-Wiliamsburg IBZ, which survived). But there's some handwriting on that wall over there ....

making sausage in Albany
This legislative "process" provides a fascinating look into how Albany "works". This bill has been introduced every year for many years, and has passed the Assembly (only) each year of the last six. I am not sure this is a sign of serious consideration or not, but the last time there were public hearings over this bill was in 2001, according to Crains.

When the original Loft Law was passed in 1982, there was detailed analysis of the impact of the law on industrial use in Soho and Tribeca. Since the last public hearings in 2001, I suspect that neighborhoods likeBushwick , Red Hook, Long Island City,Willamsburg have changed a great deal, with some areas continuing to be more or less viable for industrial use, and some less so.

The State Senate had always killed the bill. Until this year, when they didn't. The business groups say they only had about five days' notice that the Senate would pass the bill, again per Crains.

The City and State went through some kind of analysis when the 16 IBZs were created (details unknown to me), but the fight about the geographic scope for the extended bill came down to a week of arm-twisting and bluffing between the Mayor (and allies) and tenant groups, with the Governor in the middle, about those 16 IBZs.

With a midnight deadline for the Governor's signature or veto, it didn't quite make it to a middle of the night deal. But the horses somehow got traded, and everyone "agreed" that 13 IBZs would be excluded. So the Governor signed the bill.

Apparently there is a firm guarantee that the Legislature will pass "chapter amendments" excluding those 13 IBZs. (And, I have read but can't source that thethreshhold will be raised from buildings with two families with 12-month tenancies in 2008-2009 to three families.) I guess everybody trusts everybody else on those two things.

pace of Bushwick gentrification
In the course of looking for the text of the bill I checked out the website of Assembly Member Vito Lopez, who represents Bushwick and has been the long-time sponsor for this bill. He brags that tenant groups have been seeking this extension for more than 20 years and that he has been fighting ("tirelessly"!) for more than ten years. I gather that Bushwick is not in one of the protected (surviving) IBZs . The pace of change there should pick up.

I hope we can all just  get along.

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Jun. 18, 2010 - that staggeringly beautiful 5 Beekman Street

late to bandwagon, but in the parade
What the heck ... I figure there is probably a 3% chance that any Manhattan Loft Guy reader has not already seen the Nick Carr photos of the City Hall neighbor 5 Beekman Street, one of the most beautiful and odd buildings in Manhattan. But the media keep piling on, so I thought I would comment. Oh, and if you haven't seen the photos you are probably out of luck for now, as they have been taken down from Carr's site, "at the request of building representatives". Darn!

Nick has the wonderful blog Scouting New York, where he regularly posts photos of buildings he has access to through his work as a film location scout. Wednesday he hit 5 Beekman Street, in a now-gutted post. Darn! I have often wondered about photos he posts of obscure buildings that eh does not own. My guess is that he 'owns' the photos for all purposes but the ethics of being a location scout make it a complicated situation if his 'host' does not want him to publicly post photos (or maybe there is a conflict of interest with his employer if he makes it less likely for a 'host' to let a producer use a space). Darn!

the last live links?
I saw the link on Curbed, but it seems to have been pretty much everywhere, including Huffington Post (where the old link now generates a "page not found" message, since that was a post by Carr). As of this instant, the photos are still up on the New York Magazine site, which also linked to Carr's site. (I suspect it will not last, but click here to find out.) The Tribeca Citizen and the Business Insider still have it live, also, if NY Mag gets scrubbed. Gothamist has just one photo up. The original Curbed post is still live, with 7 photos.

The NY Times City Room Blog extends the ball a little further down-field, as it links to an April 19, 1998 article in which the daughter of long-time owners of 5 Beekman Street is "hopes to reopen the atrium as part of a long-term renovation. " (That didn't happen.)

You might find more still-active links, but I am stopping here. My Google search for "Nick Carr, beekman location scout" generated "about 22,600" results.

some facts from The Journal
Today the Wall Street Journal's Josh Barbanel (late, of the Old Grey Lady) has a piece about the building history that credits Carr, without a link.

BTW, WSJ has an odd on-line link policy. It will link to publicly traded companies mentioned in articles, such as US Bancorp, which appears in the last sentence of Barbanel's piece, but it won't hyperlink even when it says this:

Weird. This new media think-y is not so new anymore. But I digress....

Barbanel's main contribution

o the knowledge about 5

Street is to discover that settlement talks are underway to resolve a foreclosure, which could permit the building to be developed.

Thanks (anyway), Nick!

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Apr. 13, 2010 - Mr. Silver does NY real estate / NY Magazine basks in the glow

538 moved from 312 to 718 [update below]
Talk about a perfect marriage: the stat guru with star power, Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight fame, developed a piece for the will-scream-for-attention, NY Magazine, ranking 50 "top" NYC neighborhoods. Hilarity (and links) ensues!

Predictably, much ink (and bandwidth) is being spilled about whether the criteria are "right", whether the rankings fit one's own opinion, and why my nabe is better than yours. But what sounds from the start as a (ahem) typical NY Mag windbag agent article is redeemed by Silver's reputation and rigor. He knows the data have holes ... that definitions can be arbitrary ... that ranking closely clustered results can obscure.

These are issues that he deals with for a living, not as a mouthpiece in the Manhattan Real Estate Industrial Complex, but as a straight-shooting credentialed math geek (no offense, Mr. Silver) parsing political polling data and ranking Senate elections for likelihood of flipping. He has called out many opinion purveyors for their laxity in using data in about as heated an environment as one could have: the 2008 Presidential and Congressional elections, and the long primary road for President.

I obsessed over FiveThirtyEight when I stumbled on it, late some dark night, after having exhausted my stable of political web sites. He had me at hello ....

Rigor, meet Fluff
This really is a perfect marriage. NY Mag would run an article about Top Neighborhoods in a heartbeat, and probably has 6 times in the last 15 years. It always draws interest. But this one is different, and I suspect that Silver drove them a little batty trying to determine what (a) would be interesting to know and (b) whether it (or a proxy) can be measured. The result is a NY Mag headline with a Silver sheen. Like NY Mag at its best, The Most Livable Neighborhoods in New York is provocative and engaging. Silver is a Chicago guy, so his ear may be off a bit (but wouldn't a Chelsea guy say that about a Park Slope guy opining off his reservation??), but that's part of the fun.

Consistent with his approach to politics (and to baseball!), Silver tells you what he is doing, and why; what he is trying to get at, and what variables he is using; what judgments he's making, and acknowledging that other judgments may be equally (or more) valid. Instead of saying "here are the Top Ten", he says that if you were to tweak the importance of some metrics, the sequence would be very different. Better ... he gives you the tools to do that with his data set.

playing for a living
You get a good sense of his approach on this project when he introduced it on his 'net home base at FiveThirtyEight.com. He's playing with numbers! Not (just) because he likes to play, but because he wants (my opinion here) to explore how things we 'know' or 'think' can be judged in the real world. If that were true, how would that show up in things that people measure? What kind of measurements are more meaningful, and which are in the 'damn lies' category? How do we distinguish one from the other??

Just imagine if Silver plays with this long enough to create a tool that would permit someone to select from among 20 criteria about neighborhood "quality" (using only the 5 or 13 that are important to that person) and then weight those criteria on their own personal taste, needs, resources. I wonder if he is probing to see if something like that can be done. There might be huge potential to turn that into money, or 'just' to add to human knowledge.

In the meantime, NY Mag borrows Silver's reputation for rigor and generates a ton of commentary. (Sales? I have no idea.) You will be able to tell if it is remunerative for NY Mag by whether (and how soon) they get Silver to do this kind of thing again.

If mixing baseball with the Supreme Court is fun for a Sunday diversion (of course it is), mixing baseball and Manhattan real estate is fun and rewarding on a workday. Life is good. (Yanks open at 1:05; I understand there will be flags and jewelry.)

Welcome to town, Nate! I will buy you a beer at The Brazen Head any time. (I was aware of some details about his Baseball Prospectus days, but I would not have called him a psephologist until checking Wiki.)
 

[UPDATE: Nate put a ton of additional detail about methodology on a post at his home site; h/t Curbed; this salient quote bears adding, even at this late date of April 16:

This is a model of reality. It's a thoughtfully designed model, based on relatively high-quality and objective data sources. But like all models: it's a simplification. I think it passes the test of providing some worthwhile information which can serve as a complement to one's subjective take on the relative quality of different neighborhoods. That is, it points you more in the right direction than the wrong one. But it's not designed to be, nor could it possibly be, definitive.]
 

© Sandy Mattingly 2010
 

Mar. 31, 2010 - 9 PM on PBS: I M Pei documentary

shilling recidivist
Tonight is the night for the Anne Makepeace film that I hit last week, Mar. 24, 2010, shilling for I M Pei.  American Masters' I. M. Pei   Building China Modern will air on local Channel 13 WNET at 9 PM and will then be available on-line for 90 days (that, and other information in the link). The quick-and-dirty Manhattan Loft Guy summary:

The documentary is about I. M. Pei and his return to China to design an art museum in Suzhou, the 2,500 year-old city that his family had lived in for 600 years before his father brought him to America in the 1930s. Of course there are fascinating details about what the commission meant to him at this stage of his career (and to the local Chinese) and about his attempts to begin a new Chinese architecture while working within (sometimes very rigid) bounds of tradition and regulation 'on the ground' in China. But what interested me most was how much fun this 92 year-old man was having, and how humble he seems.

Tune in tonight!

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Mar. 24, 2010 - shilling for I M Pei

not that he needs it
I sat about 15 feet from I. M. Pei  last night, at a screening of a documentary about him that will be broadcast next Wednesday. It was one of those that's why I live in New York! moments. The documentary premiere was an hour, followed by a panel of the producer, the director/writer, and someone from the Architectural League.

The venue was The Paley Center For Media, with plush seats, wonderful sound and images, and a small (mostly?) invited audience -- certainly an engaged and interested audience. It is a fascinating thing to experience a film that pretty much no one has seen before, in a small room with its creators and its subject. Given that I have been hearing about the film-in-production for a while and that I have a close second-hand relationship with one of the creators, part of the fascination comes from watching the film on two levels: for its content / impact as a film; and as the heart-felt work of someone I know, someone I have been hearing a lot about.

I will end any 'suspense': I loved the film and am proud to know a creator. The film is American Masters' I. M. Pei   Building China Modern, part of the PBS series, and it will air on local Channel 13 WNET Wednesday, March 31 at 9 PM (as they say, check your listings for times on other PBS stations). It will then be available on-line for 90 days (that, and other information in the link).

The documentary is about I. M. Pei and his return to China to design an art museum in Suzhou, the 2,500 year-old city that his family had lived in for 600 years before his father brought him to America in the 1930s. Of course there are fascinating details about what the commission meant to him at this stage of his career (and to the local Chinese) and about his attempts to begin a new Chinese architecture while working within (sometimes very rigid) bounds of tradition and regulation 'on the ground' in China. But what interested me most was how much fun this 92 year-old man was having, and how humble he seems. Not so humble that his name isn't on the firm, or that he won't protect his vision or market his projects to the public, but humble about what he can accomplish and whether his ideas will work out.

We got a taste of the back-story to making this film from the panel, but there is more in the Inside This Episode section on the linked PBS page, with interviews with Producer Eugene Shirley and Director / Write Anne Makepeace. I will add one detail offered in the Q&A last night, which was offered by Didi Pei, architect son of Mr. Pei, in answer to an audience question about the 'special' entrance door to the new museum (which is mostly glass, with circular elements that split as the door opens). The premise of the question suggested that the door was an element created to use Chinese forms in this modern device and how fitting for this project. Didi Pei's answer: we've used that door in a lot of projects, including here at [I am blanking on which local New York hospital].

Architecture aside, I found it interesting that the Chinese government reached out to a Chinese refugee for a high-profile project. With 3 articles in today's NY Times about Google vs. China (one is here) as a battle by that government to control what the people are exposed to, it strikes me as odd to give Mr. Pei a platform (a stamp of approval, even) on an official project. The creators commented that traveling with Mr. Pei in China was like traveling with a rock star, which was a phenomenon you could see in the film. Plus, his warm manner, his fluent Chinese, his ease with everyone, from government officials to the worker who was responsible for 'scarring the rock' (see the film; you'll understand), all had to have a beneficial propaganda effect that runs counter to official story lines. I guess one 'answer' is that 'China' is just too big for all of it to move in one direction at once.

high class friends in high places
I am not aware of any Pei-designed lofts, but I do have other interests. And it is surely nice to have friends who invite me to such events. Thank you, Charles; congratulations, Anne!

I need to shill more often
Long-time readers know that Manhattan Loft Guy sometimes shamelessly promotes people or efforts that are interesting, or engaging, or by friends, or (for some other reason). I tried to help a non-profit theater group find some free space on February 26, with theater group needs some FREE space short-term / anyone have some?, but so far as I know that did not work out. I promoted a friend's art work on February 10, 2009 in diversion / art from a Manhattan loft neighborhood (do any loft building art committees need decorative art for walls or lobbies?? operators are still standing by). I linked to a fascinating collection of old-time Manhattan photos on September 25, 2008 in NYC photos / could not stop scrolling, which reminds me that I should do more linking to pictures and sites more often.

That collection indicates to me that it would take a very long-time reader to see this as a trend, and that I really should do this more often. That's one reason I started today....

all thumbs up
You can watch a preview from the PBS link. To sum up: If you have any interest in architecture or in China, I highly recommend it. If you have little interest in China or in architecture, I highly recommend it.

My favorite part: seeing that the stone garden really did work. (Nice job, 'scarring the rock' guy!)

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Mar. 16, 2010 - what about that (not yet) New Construction across the street?

good, or bad? yes and no
I had a kind of cocktail party conversation with someone who may be buying very near a high profile (pun intended) proposed Major Real Estate Development in a prime part of Manhattan. Long story (aren't they all?), but I don't represent them, so we were just talking "generally".

We talked about a lot of things: potential impact on resale value (now, during, after); quality of life issues (during, after) from noise, dust, congestion, 'tumult'; light and view impacts; and, miscellaneous. They seemed to think it worthwhile that we had this conversation, that it helped them think systematically about the risks / opportunities involved in their anticipated purchase and The Project nearby.

I tried to explain that everyone will approach a situation like this differently, for a host of idiosyncratic reasons, depending on factors such as:

• how long before they are likely to move again;
• whether the current purchase price includes a discount for (short-term?) negatives;
• if they trade light (a slice of sky) for a view of A Beautiful Building, how they value each;
• if there family members there regularly during the (noisy) work day (sleeping toddlers, work-from-home creatives);
• whether they would open their windows if they could, or prefer filtered breathing;
• whether they enjoy watching something being built (perhaps a boys-love-cranes-and-iron-workers thing);
• whether they view That Particular Project, once built, as a net benefit (a work of art?) or as a blight;
• simply: one's tolerance for uncertainty and risk

Which made me think that there might be Some Generally Applicable Principles (i.e., a worthwhile blog post) helpful to people in such a situation. Refill your coffee, if you find the topic interesting. Manhattan Loft Guy is about to wander, as some of these things bear explication.

location, location, location
Rarely is that maxim more relevant than when a huge project is involved. Is it next door? (blocking lot-line windows, endangering your party wall?) Is it across the street? (blocking light and view?) Is it around the corner? (making the beep-beeping more remote?) Is it 3 blocks away? (blocking view, but more remote for dust and congestion?) If it blocks sky, is The Money View impacted? (will you still see the river, the park, the Empire State Building?) Is it on my side of the building? (screw my neighbors on the other side!) If The Development Site runs completely through a block or sits on a corner, will the deliveries be made on 'your' side or on the other? (is your block association stronger than theirs?) Is it so close that my building will have a sidewalk shed for The Duration?

Here's one thought experiment about New Construction Nearby: the people who live on Second Avenue feel very differently about construction of the subway than people on First Avenue.

Another angle: if you lived so close to the Woolworth Building that you can tell who came to work late this morning, your windows have lost view and light (granted, the light and view was lost 100 years ago); but if you are 20 blocks away with a direct (protected!) view of that Cathedral of Commerce, that is your Money View.

One more: the folks at 474 Greenwich Street were less enthralled about construction of Zinc across the street when their foundation began to crack.

The Project
How big is it? This is most obviously important in relation to your location and view, but also about construction methods and timing ... how long will it take to drive all those piles? ...  how many hundreds of truck loads of girders will there be? ... how many weekends will my street be completely closed when they jump the crane to the next-higher level?

Which side is the construction elevator going to be on (that elevator will likely consume the sidewalk until the building facade is complete)?

Is The Project compatible with my political sensibilities? It may be one thing to live with consequences when you appreciate that the net benefit is a benefit (a school is being built or expanded; Mikhail Baryshnikov is building an arts and performance center) than when there are more bloodless capitalists building more luxury housing on a scale that is out of character for the neighborhood.

Aesthetically (whether the architect is a name or not), will you like to look at the thing when it is done? Will you find it thrilling to say (years down the road),  yes, I live across the street from The Stunning Building?

timing is everything
This might be a more important factor than location.

No matter how near or far, might you have to sell when all the negatives are apparent but before the benefits are obvious, or are you likely to glide through Construction Hell to get to The Other Side? The worst case is that you buy in without a discount for disruption (noise, loss of view, whatever) and then have to sell with a discount because the darn thing is not finished.

The best case is that you buy with a discount because The Project is real-but-not-started-yet and that you will not in any case sell before the scars have healed, the landscaping is done, and whatever benefits have sprouted.

life style
Some people buy a particular Manhattan loft or apartment entirely because of what is inside (the quality and/or amount of space), or because of the location (within a school district, proximity to work or to a park). Some of those people are essentially indifferent to what goes on outside the window. For example, people who work at night or who work 100 hours a week (medical residents) want the darker, the better.

Other people will spend all waking hours within 6 feet of a window, and anything that makes the window less attractive (noise, distraction) will impact their quality of life. The more so, those with seasonal affective disorder.

While it is (generally) true that (most) infants 'can get used to (most) everything', few infants sleep well with pile-driving.

If you work at home on Something Important That Requires Great Concentration, you might not like pile-driving either. Indeed, you might not like it that every delivery truck has to use Reverse to align at the un-loading point (beep, beep, BEEP), or that cement trucks queue up (idling) under your window, or that lunch hour for each set of trades involves a dozen professionally profane people sitting in the sun opposite your windows.

you may be paranoid but you may be right
Any construction site involves risks (and I don't mean to suggest that another crane will fall down). The longer the construction goes on, the more risk. The higher the building, the more risk. You should read this piece from Curbed to see why this guy said this about the Incredibly High Gehryness of Beekman Tower, 52 Beekman Street (hint: death is averted):

"I am not somebody who is automatically against the idea of large buildings. I'm beginning to think this tower is too tall for the neighborhood in which it's located. We have very narrow streets here, with a lot of people living nearby."

After this weekend's attacks by Mother Nature, more people may be more concerned about whether those guys up there properly secure materials hundreds of feet in the air.

sitting by the dock of the bay
The physical orientation on the completed project can be very significant, particularly if there is a commercial component to The Project. A 100% residential building gets city Department of Sanitation service (day times); a commercial establishment (office, hotel, restaurant, museum, whatever) gets private carting services, which are generally at off-hours and (all too often) at 4 AM.

I once lived in a loft building with bedrooms in the back. The good news is there was a lot of light in the back because of a parking lot; the bad news was the buildings across from and adjoining that parking lot had commercial trash pick-ups in the wee small hours. Part A: beep, beep, BEEP. Part B: the grinding of hydraulics as they lifted metal trash bins. Part C: dropping said bins on the sidewalk.

How likely is it that you can get someone to tell you where the trash will be completed for a not-yet-built building? How motivated are you to find out? If your bedrooms are on that side, you might want to check that out.

Apart from trash, many commercial buildings get many deliveries throughout the day and evening. From the beep-beep of FedEx trucks, to semi-trucks hauling large pieces of equipment, or machinery, or just stuff. If that loading dock is on your side, you may hear it.

benefits ... we got benefits
When the darn thing is up, some buildings add a lot to the immediate neighborhood ... from a stretch of new street level retail for an under-served area (many blocks need another dry cleaner; some blocks really need a bank; most don't 'need' another nail salon) ... to just being a nicer,  safer (better lit!) street scene to walk by.

Some new developments increase property values; a few ... err ... don't (methadone clinic? city agencies? some schools, some say).

Some people are afraid that if a 'nicer' residential building comes in, their building will suffer by comparison. My read of history is this is logical but not proven by reality. The property values for Your Basic Small Coop Loft in Tribeca have been enhanced, repeatedly, by the addition to the neighborhood of uber condos, and of even regular condos. That rising tide does tend to float all boats. (But this is true only if you sell after the benefits are felt.)

This rising tide can work even if the new development destroys some specific part of your value. I am thinking here of the Lincoln Towers complex in the West 60s along West End Avenue. The river views of nearly all residents here have been lost by the time that (that Trump abomination to Manhattan street naming convention) "Riverside Boulevard" was filled in. Yet it is my impression that the collateral benefits to these West End Avenue buildings from having so many high-end condos and rental properties nearby (cabs, street retail, general cachet) have made up for the immediate loss in market value driven by the lost river views (though not for the loss of the views, esthetically).

In this regard, "light" must be distinguished from "views". A new development that blocks certain lovely views but leaves your home well-lighted would be a very different outcome from a new development that was so close and so tall that you are plunged into darkness. I have seen lofts along Worth Street that have suffered market declines of a half-million dollars because of massive nearby building. Sucks when it happens to you.

NIMBYs can always hope
Sometimes "projects" don't become "buildings". We've seen that recently caused by changes in the market and credit conditions (56 Leonard Street), sometimes by local opposition that is well-placed politically (I am looking at you, Greenwich Village whatever-for-historic-preservation), sometimes by a combination of the two. But one should be very leery before predicting that a Neighboring Monstrosity can be stopped.

net-net, it is up to YOU
Overall, all of the things I have talked about (and the other elements that will occur to you as you read this, or me after I hit SEND) depend on your tolerance for risk, your tolerance for temporary noise, dust, congestion, your tolerance for experiencing Life In The Big City. That tolerance -- for any of these elements -- probably will change over time. Developers' schedules, appetites and capital may or may not coincide with your cycle of tolerance. And (or) you may find out that things that you 'knew' you had to have (could not live without) are not as sacred as you thought.

It is THE BIG CITY. Nothing stays the same. Deal with it.

Or not. As you prefer. It is your choice.

Hope this helps.

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Feb. 26, 2010 - theater group needs some FREE space short-term / anyone have some?

outsourcing
I got an interesting request from someone affiliated with a small non-profit theater company that needs donated space for a small site-specific production from April 20 to May 9. I will try to figure out if I know any suitable angel-with-space and will make inquiries within Corcoran, but I wonder if YOU might be able to help.

yes ... YOU
The request came from a Manhattan Loft Guy reader who made appropriately brown-nosing comments about this blog and even promised to comment every day if I can help find space. (That last bit was over-kill, really, but she did say it.)

requirements + specifications

• the group has insurance (they've done this before)
• attendance could be up to 40 people, or as small at 15
• cast of 3
• they need exclusive access for rehearsal and performance times; otherwise could share space
• types of spaces that might work:

apartment (loft style = "ideal")
hotel suite
retail (clothing) space
private club room
"church-like" space (but not a church)

the close...
If any of you knows of possibly suitable space (or has such space), send me an email and I will put you in touch with these folks to ask questions, confirm they are people you'd want in your space, etc. [Sandy AT Manhattan Loft Guy DOT com] Remember: they are looking for donated space.

Wouldn't it be nice if a reader of MLG could help out another reader with a loft? Anyone planning a 3 week vacation soon?
 

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Feb. 20, 2010 - 38 Warren Street and other loft buildings in 1894 (lamp + "gas trimmings" importers & more)

The Google is my (distracting) friend
I played around on Google when I was looking at the listing history of 38 Warren Street (for the February 19, was the terrace free at 38 Warren Street?) and found some interesting history history for that building, and for others since converted to residential lofts. "Interesting" to Manhattan Loft Guy, at least, so if you may be of a similar mind, read on, as we dive deep in the NY Times archives, almost to the birth of the Ochs - Sulzberger era Times.

The Paper of Record was not yet an old grey lady when it ran this piece on August 31, 1984, Marked Revival of Trade. Apparently, the merchant class in Manhattan was then feeling relieved, with the country coming out of a depression, "the tariff question" having been settled, and out of town buyers flooding Manhattan wholesalers and hotels.

In all branches of trade merchants realize that the period of depression has passed, and they look forward to continued activity and profit for some time to come.

Buyers from out of town have come into the city within the last few days by the thousands and there is activity in all the wholesale districts.

Those "wholesale districts" in 1894 include

38 and 42 Warren Street, now in 38-44 Warren Street
Here's the connection to 38 Warren Street:

At the office of McFadden & Co., importers and dealers in lamps and gas trimmings at 38 Warren Street, A.N. White of the firm said

"We have had many buyers in, and our business is good and increasing. We also have good reports from our men on the road. ... Our collections are easier, which indicates to us a more plentiful use of money by the customers of our customers and a more general consumption of goods...."

Since that condo was formed by the combination of four buildings and is referred to as 38-44 Warren Street, these guys were also on site:

At the office of L. Strauss & Son, dealers in china and glassware, at 42 to 46 Warren Street and 116 Chambers Street, Lee Kohns, a member of the firm was seen. He was in a most happy frame of mind over the business outlook.... 

  "That the good effects of the settlement of the tariff question are making themselves felt must be apparent to every merchant.... We are so busy now we are working our men day and night. ... In anticipation of tariff changes, all goods sold in the Spring for Fall delivery were locked up in bonded warehouses, pending settlement of the question, in order that purchasers might reap the benefits of the reduced rates of duty. These wares can now be shipped...."

another MLG appearance by 1200 Broadway
This August 31, 1894 article also quotes a good many hotels who benefited from the commercial horde. One is a residential loft building hit too frequently on Manhattan Loft Guy to cite:

At the Gilsey House it was said: "There has been a large increase of travel this week. Business men, men whom we know to be regular buyers, are flocking in. There has been no question that there has been an improvement in conditions since the tariff question was settled."

One recent Gilsey House (1200 Broadway) link to a recent NY Times article will add a little to my Gilsey House trove, but I will not further digress from 1894 to quote that article.

In trying to get back to that August 31, 1894 article, I re-ran a search in the times archives and got an article from a week later along the same lines, with a series of quotes from merchants at addresses that indicate how much business was done in the current loft districts, TRADE GATHERING MOMENTUM; IMPROVEMENT IN BUSINESS KEEPING UP VIGOROUSLY.

some 1894 lofts are now offices (darn)
This September 6, 1894 article references many businesses on current residential loft streets, but many of these addresses now have offices or rental buildings, rather than loft coops or condos. Interesting to see, nonetheless, the publisher at 766 Broadway (Charles T. Dillingham & Co.), the bicycle manufacturer at 12 Warren Street, the furniture dealer T 193 Park Row, the "cloaks and suits" company at Fifth Avenue at 22nd Street, and the "collars and cuffs" company at 33 East 17 Street.

So much for tripping down memory lane, for today at least.

© Sandy Mattingly 2010

Sep. 11, 2009 - 8 years, still fresh

quote of the day
Rudy Giuliani, whom I loathe, read this morning from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., whom I revere. Let's just say that Rudy made a nice choice:

“Everybody can be great,” he said, “because anybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love.”

R.I.P.  2,752 souls (up 1 since last year) Plus those at The Pentagon and in Shanksville.

Basic coverage, with a strong WTC-focus: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/11/remembering-the-horror-of-a-bright-blue-morning/?hp

(as if you need additional links for this)

© Sandy Mattingly 2009

Feb. 10, 2009 - diversion / art from a Manhattan loft neighborhood

Nov. 8, 2008 - into the melting pot (with a grain of salt?)

'minority' majority + bare majority only English

Crain's New York Business had an on-line link yesterday to some "City Facts" that are intersting but that made me wonder if I needed salt with those (fries). (Their visuals are more ... well, visual than my text will be....)

Crain's Fact #1: in 2006, the racial/ethnic (not the same things, but oh well ... that's what the Census Bureau does too) background of the 8,214,426 estimated residents of New York City were (1) "White" 34.5%, (2) Hispanic/Latino 27.9%, (3) Black/African American 23.8%, and (4) Asian 11.5%. In other words, we are (and have been for a while) a city in which the so-called "majority" is a minority of the population. While 1.3% is reported as "other", 0.9% is reported as "two or more races", which I found to be surprisingly low.

Unfortunately, I can't click to a source for these data from Crain's, so I don't know how reliable the data are.

Some salt: I went to the US Census Bureau web page, here, where I easily found information from 2000 (if they have updated ethnic/race data I did not dig for it). If the search page holds, you will see that in 2000 the White proportion was reported as 44.7% of the City's population, with Hispanic/Latino as 27%, Black as 26.6%, and Asian as 9.8%. So, way back then us white folk were an overall minority, but not nearly as dramatically as claimed by Crain's for 2006.

Could the mix have changed so much in 6 years? (Note that the Census estimates the 2006 population as the figure that Crain's uses, 8,214,426, which is only a 2.6% overall increase -- hardly enough to swing the ratios even if all the 2.6% were non-white.) And note that the Black/AA and Asian proportions are lower in the Crain's 2006 numbers than in the Census Bureau's 2000 numbers. So, use the salt here....

Crain's Fact #2:  in 2006, out of a total of 7,637,820 people of the age of 5 or older (funny way to count, but, whatever) in the City, (only) 3,981,767 speak only English at home (which is 52.1% -- a bare majority), while 1,883,804 (also?) speak Spanish, 381,506 (also?) speak Chinese, 193,563 (also?) speak Russian, and 174,140 (also?) speak French (including Creole and other derivatives). 

The remainder is a rather large number of 'other' New Yorkers -- some 600,000+ folks aged 5 or older who may speak English at home but also (or exclusively) speak a language other than Spanish, Chinese, Russian or French.

Did you notice how the French and Russian language speakers seem to have been reversed (or something) in the Crain's chart? Perhaps the Russian speakers were counted with a surge at the end, that upset their sequencing?? ;-) 

Note to self: check other cities in the 2000 Census Bureau data to see how relatively diverse our NYC melting pot is.

Oct. 2, 2008 - Manhattan as 'different' (not unique) / counting geniuses + immigrants

a reflection, not a rigorous analysis
I am not a card-carrying member of the Manhattan Is Unique So Real Estate Price Will Never Come Down party, but I have audited classes in the Manhattan Market Is Different school.

I noted with interest an article about the number of MacArthur Foundation grants to Manhattan residents when the NY Times reported on that last week (September 26: A Genius on Every Block? No, but It Seems That Way), which lead to the kernel of an idea about a blog post, which got overlooked in the press of the Business and Life Continuum. I was thinking aboutabout how this article about Manhattan-as-magnet-for-talent had real estate relevance. posting

But what spurred me to actually use bandwidth and time to address this was this piece reported yesterday on-line in the national REALTOR® rag (and sourced to Forbes) about some cities losingtheir attraction for immigrants (Where the Melting Pot Has Frozen). Sort of the other side (or another side) of the same coin.

on the one hand, a draw
Clyde Haberman of the Times points out that

As Haberman explains about these so-called "genius" grants, MacArthur officials frown on the word “genius,” leaving it to journalists and assorted other hacks. Rather, the foundation says that it looks for women and men who are able to “transcend traditional boundaries,” who are risk-takers even in the face of obstacles, who can “synthesize disparate ideas and approaches.”

I have said repeatedly the one of the things that makes our local real estate market different from others is that Manhattan has always been a magnet for creativity, ambition and entrepreneurship. In the context of a city deemed to be safer and more 'livable' by people with huge wealth or income who used to move to the 'burbs, that has definitely helped create demand for scarce Manhattan housing. Add the globalization of wealth and travel to that creativity-ambition-entrepreneurship magnet, and there is yet another different strand increasing demand.

Haberman put it poetically, in historical terms:

(I HEART Clyde.) Note that, in my opinion, neither Boston nor California have other attractions to a global market that Manhattan has.

Of course, these kind of attractions are both ephemeral and fragile. There is no reason to assume that they will continue to make Manhattan a different real estate market indefinitely, and it may be hard to predict when an accumulation of 'bad news' will hurt the Manhattan 'brand' enough to make a significant difference. But I see that situation holding, at least until we see more and deeper bad news on a systemic basis.

(snobbery, admitted
Yes, Haberman talks about MacArthur grants to city residents, rather than to Manhattan residents. But I am enough of a Manhattan snob to assume that the bulk of "city residents" who win these grants are Manhattan-based, either as residents or workers. [Go ahead, prove me wrong.]

I don't think it much matters for my general point, however.)

on the other hand, not so much
Not only do other cities generally lack the creativity-ambition-entrepreneurship magnet that Manhattan has, but other cities are losing the degree to which they are attractive to immigrants at all, at least according to Forbes. As reported on-line by REALTOR.org,

They don't mention New York, which still seems to be a magnet for immigrants based on everything I have read. (No sourcing here, but I recall reading that New York City's recent population growth is entirely attributable to in-migration of foreign-born and increased birth rate among recent immigrants.) But they did count the cities with the lowest percentages of foreign-born residents:

• Pittsburgh, 3.1 percent
• Cincinnati, 3.5 percent
• St. Louis, 4 percent
• Indianapolis, 5.4 percent
• Cleveland, 5.6 percent
• Virginia Beach, Va.. 5.6 percent
• Kansas City, Mo., 5.9 percent
• Columbus, Ohio 6.3 percent
• Nashville, Tenn. 6.7 percent
• Milwaukee, 6.8 percent

Once again, my man Clyde hits it on the nose:

As a footnote, in the endless debate over immigration, you could cite the MacArthur program as evidence that the United States, for all its troubles, remains the place where many of the world’s brightest want to be. This year’s winners, all of whom must be citizens or residents of this country, include people originally from Nigeria, Russia, Croatia, Egypt, Tanzania, England and Canada.

... Nearly all the New York [MacArthur] winners ... came here from somewhere else.

so what?
So, this won't prevent a decline in Manhattan real estate values -- if that is what general and local economic trends have in store for us -- but these related factor do provide some additional (unique?) layer of insulation from the otherwise cold that our market may feel. Call me Pollyanna if you like (so long as you call).

Sep. 25, 2008 - NYC photos / could not stop scrolling

is it memory lane if I am too young to remember (or to have been alive then)?
Hat tip to today's Today's MUG from Manhattan User's Guide for linking to a forum on WiredNY with an amazing collection of photos, mostly of Manhattan, mostly black and white, some more than a hundred years old. Once I started scrolling, I kept thinking, only a few more, then I will get back to work.... But I scrolled through the whole thing in one sitting.

one Manhattan loft angle
I am sure that many pictures could front stories about Manhattan lofts (especially the Broadway shots), but the one that immediately caught my eye with a Manhattan Loft Guy angle is the 10th one down, "Tiffany's Union Square" from 1899. That is the building now marketed as 15 Union Square West, which I touched on in a very early post: July 7, 2006: dynamic city / time runs out on a stripped Tiffany's.

condo inevitability, indeed
But I was wrong about "the inevitable condo": the structure hasn't been torn down for condo development, but stripped to its 130 year old cast-iron skeleton and reclad in glass over the cast-iron  (and gut renovated, of course), with another 6 stories built on top.  http://www.15usw.com/

Enjoy the photos ... see if you can pull away before scrolling through them all.
 

Sep. 11, 2008 - September 11, again

I will re-post what I said on this date two years ago, slightly updated:

Dec. 20, 2007 - NYC Housing Stock / distribution of renters + owners, coops, condos, houses

THX to REBNY for sending along a pie chart from the US Census Bureau 2005 Housing Survey of the distribution of housing types in the City as a whole (beggars would want to see Manhattan only, but we can't be choosers here).

Couple of interesting things, at first blush. REBNY highlighted the fact that 67% of the City's housing units are rental units, while another 21% are "conventional homes". City-wide, there are only 76,060 condo units and 309,195 coop apartments, a 1:4 ratio. With 3.1 million households, the average household size is less than 2.7 people -- I suspect that number is well below the national average.

Interesting stuff.

(C) Sandy Mattingly 2007

Nov. 14, 2007 - 176 Perry has new loft in mid-8 figures

Jul. 24, 2007 - Gilsey House ancient history (circa 1980)

Jul. 14, 2007 - R.I.P.

Nov. 30, 2006 - Manhattan Users Guide on Nannyhattan

Nov. 27, 2006 - isn’t Williamsburg enough? / cities competing for hipsters