Manhattan’s Pieds-à-Terre | Rent Freezes | FEMA Flood Zones Shrink

Manhattan’s Sixth Avenue used to command some of the highest office rents in the city. (Keith Bedford/WSJ)

1. Quinn, de Blasio & Liu advocate rent freezes at hearing. “At the Rent Guidelines Board public hearing on Thursday, much of the theater and drama were as always: tenants insisting that the proposed increase at rent-stabilized apartments in New York City was far too high, and landlords complaining that it was far too low.But with this being a mayoral election year, the hearing featured a few different actors.” [New York Times – 06/13/13]
2. FEMA scales back Jersey flood zones after controversy. “The Federal Emergency Management Agency has shrunk the area along the New Jersey shore that it considers vulnerable to high wave action during hurricanes and other storms. The agency released advisory maps in December that vastly expanded the so-called V-zones, where waves could cause severe damage to property.” [WNYC – 06/17/13]
3. Lower Manhattan developers carve out new neighborhood. “As New York neighborhoods get sliced and diced like onions into increasingly small sections, a scrap of Lower Manhattan has now become the ‘Northwest East Village’ - that is, if one is to believe the developers of a condominium there called the Jefferson. It is at 211 East 13th Street - comfortably inside the purported new neighborhood, which, according to a map on the condo’s Web site, runs from about East 11th to East 14th Street, from Avenue A to Third Avenue.” [New York Times – 06/14/13]
4. Lenders hit homeowners with court action years after foreclosures. “For Jose Santos Benavides, the ordeal of losing his home was over. On Aug. 20, 2008, one year after he bought his dream home for $469,000, the bank’s threat to take his house became real via a letter in the mail. Just four days before the bank seized the property, he moved out, along with his wife and their two young children.That wasn’t the worst of it. In November, more than three years after the foreclosure, he was stunned to learn he still owed $115,000 - with the interest alone growing at a rate high enough to lease a luxury car.” [Washington Post – 06/15/13]
5. Trading in the Hamptons for a Manhattan summer home. “While Manhattanites fight traffic to get out of the city, a rare breed of part-timer is breezing in from the other direction. In something of a reverse migration, these summertime city dwellers trade their retreats near the beach, lake or mountains for pieds-à-terre and long-term rentals in Manhattan, tolerating the heat, humidity and pungent warm-weather smells in exchange for a more laid-back New York.” [New York Times – 06/14/13]
6. De Blasio on the Rent Guidelines Board: “A failure of the democratic process.” “Public Advocate and mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio is not happy that the Rent Guidelines Board, which decides rules on allowable rent hikes for stabilized apartments each year, has, citing poor attendance, stopped holding meetings outside of Manhattan.” [New York Observer – 06/14/13]
7. Housing First to announce affordable housing proposal for NYC’s next mayor. “A broad coalition of housing groups whose ideas were reflected in Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to create or preserve some 165,000 ‘affordable’ housing units is pushing for the next mayor to embrace an equally ambitious housing agenda despite increased funding constraints.” [Wall Street Journal – 06/14/13]
8. Abundant space and falling rents for Sixth Avenue. “Manhattan’s Sixth Avenue used to command some of the highest office rents in the city thanks to the appeal of its hulking towers to big-name companies like Exxon Mobil Corp., J.C. Penney Inc.and Time Warner Inc. But these days Sixth Avenue is getting hit by a double-whammy. On one hand, expanding technology companies are the biggest source of growth in the office market and these companies favor older buildings and hip neighborhoods.On the other hand, Sixth Avenue has seen about a half-dozen big blocks of space come on the market from tenants moving, contracting or failing.” [Wall Street Journal – 06/16/13]
9. Builder confidence in demand reaches positive territory for first time in seven years. “It’s been 7 years since the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index has hovered above an index score of 50. But that feat was finally accomplished on Monday with NAHBnoting a new builder confidence index score of 52 for single-family homes - an eight point increase from the previous report.” [Housing Wire – 06/17/13]