NYC – Buyers look to the boroughs
By Ted Phillips
amNewYork Staff Writer
August 9, 2006
Monifa Thomas, a working mom with a young son and another on the way, had been looking for a place she could afford for more than a year when she landed a spacious co-op in Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy neighborhood listed for $155,000.
"I think I lucked out," said Thomas, 32, who had been priced out of her current neighborhood of Fort Greene.
The 800-square-foot railroad apartment where Thomas plans to live with her husband, 7-year-old son and newborn due in October was reserved for middle-income buyers. On the open market, the apartment -- now in contract -- probably could have sold for double that amount, brokers said.
The Housing Development Fund Corp. co-op was originally was owned by the city and then turned over to the residents for a small fee. Part of the agreement was that the units could only be sold to people meeting income guidelines.
In her case, Thomas, a social worker for the city's Administration for Children's Services, qualified because the annual income of her family was less than $77,000.
Even with the price break, Thomas has had to scrimp and save to meet the costs. They are "eating out less, cutting back on certain organic foods, … going to movies (less often) and stuff like that," she said.
Anyone who has looked to buy in the city knows deals like the one Thomas found are few and far between.
"You can't build homes fast enough to fill the demand," said Pat Julien of the Pratt Area Community Council, a Brooklyn-based group that follows housing issues.
In most of the United States, buying a home is a rite of passage into adulthood. New York City is different, especially for those people who hoped to buy in Manhattan, where the median price of an apartment in the first quarter of this year was $880,000, according to Prudential Douglas Elliman.
First-time homebuyers can find better deals in the boroughs. On Craigslist.org, there is no shortage of listings for under $200,000 for people willing to buy in the Parkchester section of the Bronx or Rego Park, Queens.
The median price for a condo in Brooklyn in the second of quarter of this year was $585,000, according to the Corcoran Group. And The Real Deal, a real estate magazine, recently reported the median price of a home in the Bronx was $400,000.
"It's a dream for a couple to own something, to have something that's ours," said Mike Medina, 42, who was among 1,000 people attending a homebuyers' fair sponsored by Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion earlier this summer.
He and his girlfriend pay $1,000 a month in rent. "That's (money) that could go to a house," he said.
Shirley Brown, 58, a city employee, also attended the fair and listened closely to a presentation on a program by the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development that helps first-time homebuyers within a certain income limits come up with money for a down payment or closing costs.
Brown has her heart set on the Shorehaven development in the Soundview section of the Bronx, where her name is on a waiting list. She still goes on the Internet to compare prices in the area.
"You have to live it, breathe it. Even if you are not ready," she said. ""If you wait until you are ready, you won't have a clue."
As New Yorkers struggle to find housing they can afford, the mayor's office has set into motion a program it hopes will ease the tight market.
The Bloomberg administration's New Housing Marketplace plan proposes to create or preserve more than 48,000 units of affordable housing for purchase by 2013.
Most of the housing in the plan – including additional rental units -- would be available for people making 80% of a set median income, about $50,000 for a family of four. The plan also calls for moderate and median income housing for New Yorkers making between $50,000 and $100,000 a year.
But experts and house hunters know that even with the city's effort, affordable housing will remain elusive.
"The person who's making a median income, the only way they can get a home is if they get lucky and get in to a lottery for a development project," said Julien, of the Pratt Council.
Thomas' advice to others is to be patient and prudent.
"Sometimes you find a place and you really love it, but when you crunch the numbers you realize how hard it's going to be … sometimes it's hard to walk," she said.
