Housing Starts: Mortgage Troubles Back? | Predicting Gentrification | Crown Heights Displacement

The street art scene in East Bushwick. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

1. You Thought the Mortgage Crisis Was Over? It’s About to Flare Up Again “We are nearly eight years removed from the beginnings of the foreclosure crisis, with over five million homes lost. So it would be natural to believe that the crisis has receded. Statistics point in that direction. Financial analyst CoreLogic reportsthat the national foreclosure rate fell to 1.7 percent in June, down from 2.5 percent a year ago. Sales of foreclosed properties are at their lowest levels since 2008, and the rate of foreclosure starts—the beginning of the foreclosure process—is at 2006 levels. At the peak, 2.9 million homes suffered foreclosure filings in 2010; last year, the number was 1.4 million. But these numbers are likely to reverse next year, with foreclosures spiking again. And it has nothing to do with recent-vintage loans, which actually have performed as well as any in decades. Instead, a series of temporary relief measures and legacy issues from the crisis will begin to bite in 2015, causing home repossessions that could present economic headwinds. In other words, the foreclosure crisis was never solved; it was deferred. And next year, the clock begins to run out on that deferral.” [New Republic – 08/24/14]
2. Predicting the Past “It’s hard to go a day in New York City without hearing about some neighborhood on the verge of gentrification—it’s an obsession. The morning this magazine was going to press NY1 aired a report about how some residents of a South Bronx neighborhood believe it is the ‘next Williamsburg.’ The same word—‘gentrification’—is now used as both a byword and a curse.” [Capital New York – 08/27/14]
3. Is Homeownership Really Falling Out of Favor? “Homeownership seems to be falling out of favor.  Newspapers these days are peppered with articles that highlight the skepticism of younger Americans about whether buying a home is a good investment, and with so many people still suffering the effects of the housing crisis that started in 2008, who can blame them?  The MacArthur Foundation recently published the results of a nationwide survey of Americans’ attitudes and perceptions about housing.  Based on this survey, many people feel that, given the changes over the past several decades in the way we live our lives, renting a home has become more appealing and owning less appealing.  Perhaps more surprisingly, a majority of adults believe that renters can be just as successful as owners at achieving the American Dream.  But is this really true, or, in the current backlash against homeownership, are we in danger of throwing out the baby along with the bath water?” [Rooflines – 08/22/14]
4. ‘Poor Door’ in a New York Tower Opens a Fight Over Affordable Housing “The so-called poor door has brought an outcry, with numerous officialsnow demanding an end to the strategy. But the question of how to best incorporate affordable units into projects built for the rich has become more relevant than ever as Mayor Bill de Blasio seeks the construction of 80,000 new affordable units over the next 10 years. The answer is not a simple one. As public housing becomes a crumbling relic of another era, American cities have grown more reliant on the private sector to build housing for the poor and working class. Developers say they can maximize their revenues, and thus build more affordable units, by separating them from their luxury counterparts.Even advocates of affordable housing are divided on the issue; some argue that developers who segregate apartments should not benefit from government incentives, while others say the focus should be on building more homes, rather than where to enter them.” [New York Times – 08/27/14]
5. Crown Heights Tenants Battle to Stay in Rent Stabilized Apartments as Building Slowly Converts to Luxury Rentals “When Joan Golding’s new landlord offered $65,000 if she’d leave her rent-stabilized one-bedroom apartment in Crown Heights earlier this year, she initially jumped at the offer. But the administrative assistant says she couldn’t find anywhere else to live within her means in the rapidly gentrifying neighborhood. ‘Everything was just way, way too expensive,’ she recalled, noting that most landlords were asking upwards of $3,000 per month. After two months, she gave back the initial $10,000 payment from the building’s new owner, BCB Property Management, a private equity real estate firm that purchased the building in June 2013 for $8.2 million, according to a published report.” [New York Daily News – 08/27/14]
6. Airbnb to Expose 124 Hosts to New York Attorney General “Airbnb plans to hand over the names and addresses of 124 hosts on its service to the New York attorney general, the company said in a blog post Friday. The apartment-rental site agreed in May to provide Attorney General Eric Schneiderman with anonymous information on about 16,000 hosts in the city as well as the names and contact information of individual users the regulator chooses to investigate for possible enforcement action. The attorney general is trying to gather data to show that Airbnb’s site is in violation of a local hotel law that prohibits people from renting apartments for fewer than 30 days unless the occupants are also present. His office issued subpoenas requesting the data last fall, estimating that the state and city lost out on tens of millions of dollars over the past three years in unpaid taxes.” [Wall Street Journal – 08/22/14]
7. Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen on Expanding Affordable Housing “Mayor Bill de Blasio unveiled his $41 billion Housing New York plan in January 2014. The plan sets out to build or preserve 200,000 units of affordable housing over the next ten years, aiming higher than the Koch administration with 190,000 units over 13 years, and the Bloomberg administration with 165,000 units over 12 years. The de Blasio administration has dubbed Housing New York “the most expansive and ambitious affordable housing agenda of its kind in the nation’s history.” But are 200,000 units enough for New York City’s rapidly growing population? Alicia Glen, the city’s Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development, is in charge of realizing the plan. Glen, formerly head of Goldman Sachs’ Urban Investment Group, first tackled affordable housing under Mayor Giuliani as the Assistant Commissioner for Housing Finance with the city’s Department of Housing, Preservation and Development.” [Thirteen – 08/27/14]
8. Can Cities Ease Homelessness with Storage Units? “Back in the fall of 2009, some three-dozen San Diegans were taking in a Sunday church service when they lost everything. These people were homeless, so while they enjoyed food and worship inside the church, they parked their belongings outside. That’s where agents from the city’s Environmental Services Department rounded up these possessions—heirlooms, clothing, sleeping bags, medication—and then crushed them in the back of a garbage truck. A class-action lawsuit followed, and as a result, the city agreed to provide funding for a better answer to the complaints that follow the homeless wherever they go. Borrowing a page from Los Angeles, San Diego launched its Transitional Storage Center, a secure facility where the homeless can store their possessions as they go about their days.” [CityLab – 08/25/14]
9. Brick By Brick: De Blasio Taking Ambitious Approach to City’s Affordable Housing Problem “In a city as diverse as New York, there is one issue that nearly everyone can relate to: the high cost of housing. Unless you are among the lucky few to land a rent-regulated apartment, residents here increasingly find themselves spending hefty chunks of their paychecks on rent. The affordable housing crunch has triggered waves of gentrification. It even inspired the creation of a political party, the Rent is Too Damn High Party. Mayor Bill de Blasio is hardly the first mayor to try and tackle the problem, but his approach is shaping up to be the most ambitious the city has seen in recent memory.” [NY1 – 08/27/14]
10. Affordable Battery Place Rental Building Sold by Developer Specializing in Condo Conversions “The rental building at 70 Battery Place, also known as Riverwatch, is being sold to a real estate developer who specializes in converting rental buildings to condominiums. The purchaser, Brooklyn-based Clipper Equities, is in the final stages of obtaining approval from lenders and regulators to close on the purchase, and is expected to take title to the building by the end of August. The final price of the sale was not disclosed, but documents reviewed by the Broadsheet indicate that Clipper Equities has obtained a $50 million mortgage in order to purchase the building.” [Broadsheet Daily – 08/27/14]