W’burg, Park Slope, Bay Ridge, Crown Heights Are Still Hot
By Dennis Holt
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
brooklyn — New data on Brooklyn home sales in 2006 and 2005 published by Halstead Property and a report from HMS Associates on the first quarter of this year both show the continuation of a Brooklyn boom. However, red flags may have been raised early this year.

A report from HMS, an appraisal firm headquartered in Brooklyn, shows that Brooklyn home prices in 16 communities rose almost nine percent in the first quarter of 2007 to $757,000 from $696,000 in the same period last year.

The data include single-family and multi-family homes as well as condos.

A breakdown of the three kinds of housing units shows that single-family houses increased from $607,000 to $688,000, multi-family from $989,000 to $1.164 million, and condos from $437,000 to $551,000 within 12 months.

But there were two red flags worth noting. A great deal has been said about the high level of foreclosures of “subprime� borrowers, and data from Bed-Stuy, Bushwick and Brownsville were not included in this report.

This could have statistical significance because those three communities have a high volume of house sales every year. For example, more than 3,600 houses were sold in the last two years in the three neighborhoods.

And although the period reported covers only about 90 days, the rise in house prices was not uniform. Five neighborhoods showed increases — Williamsburg, Bay Ridge, Park Slope, Crown Heights and Boerum Hill — while five others showed declines — Greenpoint, Carroll Gardens, Clinton Hill, Brooklyn Heights in Sheepshead Bay.

New yearly data from Halstead, a unit of Terra Holdings, show an incredibly busy two years for single- and multi-family housing sales in Brooklyn. During those 24 months, 18,507 houses were bought and sold for a total of $11.909 billion. That comes out to an average house sale value of $643,491. The average value in the U.S. is $227,000.

Total sales last year were $6.294 billion, compared to $5.614 billion in 2005.

About half the Brooklyn houses sold in those two years were clustered in only seven Brooklyn communities — Bed-Stuy, Bensonhurst, Boro Park, Bushwick, Canarsie, East Flatbush and East New York.

In terms of dollars per house, another cluster, the brownstone neighborhoods and Manhattan Beach, came in with 850 houses valued at more than $1 million. There were 690 houses in five other communities that averaged more than $800,000. Together, these 1,540 houses reached averages in 2006 and 2005 of $1.224 million.

It is important to note that the Halstead report does not include condo or co-op sales, a growing dynamic in Brooklyn.

© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2007
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