marylander1940 Posted March 23 Posted March 23 This $59 million home for sale in California features a shark tank WWW.FOXBUSINESS.COM A modern home featuring a shark tank has gone up for sale with an eight-figure asking price in sunny Southern California.
samhexum Posted March 25 Posted March 25 (edited) This Brooklyn apartment complex was built like a Lego set The building will be affordable housing for seniors; it was designed using passive house principles and was constructed from modular units. When construction started on a new affordable apartment building in Brooklyn, most of the work on the site happened very quickly. Instead of typical construction, cranes lifted giant modular units into the air—each made up of two separate apartments, plus the corridor between them—and set them into place. Trucks delivered nearly four dozen 60-foot-long “mods” from the factory where they were built in Pennsylvania, staging them next to a nearby cemetery in the Brooklyn neighborhood of East Flatbush. Then, each day for two weeks, construction crews stacked together as many as six of the units to build the complex, called Bethany Terraces. (The massive size of the units made them more challenging to transport than a single modular apartment at a time, but the configuration helped shrink the time for installation on site.) The apartments were essentially 100% complete inside. (Appliances were strapped to the corridors and just had to be slid into place.) The crew only had to weld the units together and connect wiring and plumbing from each apartment to the hallway. After all of the units were attached, the crew added continuous insulation to the outside and finished other elements like the roof. A project of this size, with 57 apartments and four stories, could have taken 30 months to build, says Yolanda do Campo, director of construction at RiseBoro, the nonprofit developer behind the project. Instead, it took only 22 months. A shorter timeline means significant savings. “Less construction time means fewer months of interest payments,” do Campo says. Interest payments for the project average around $100,000 a month. It also means, of course, that residents can start moving in faster. In this case, the apartments are limited to seniors in New York City’s affordable housing lottery, with a percentage of the units reserved for seniors who were previously homeless. The process has still taken time, in part because of the bureaucracy involved with the housing lottery. The building was completed last fall; the first residents started moving in in January and only a handful live there so far. But faster construction helped. As builders gain more experience in modular construction, it could happen even more quickly. “I really do think that we do this a couple more times and we’re seeing a building come in 15, 16 months, which is somewhat unheard of for something like this,” says Grayson Jordan, principal at Paul A. Castrucci Architects, the architecture firm behind the building’s design. While modular apartment buildings are starting to become more common in cities, the project went a step further with a “passive house” design, meaning that it has ultra-low energy demand. The building is well-insulated and airtight. The hot water system runs on a heat pump. The apartments are all-electric and designed to run on solar power, so the building can get as close to net zero energy use as possible. “RiseBoro pays for some of the utilities of the tenants,” says do Campo. “So being passive house and saving energy is critical to the business model—besides contributing to sustainability, we lower the monthly bills.” RiseBoro has pioneered energy-efficient design in other projects, including adding sleek new facades to aging apartment buildings to help them shrink energy use by 80%. Outside, the south side of the building has stepped terraces instead of a flat wall, creating a series of outdoor community spaces for residents and more space for solar panels. There was a learning curve to using modular construction; since the local construction crew didn’t have expertise working with modular units, Riseboro had to help coordinate between the factory and the crew on the ground. But it will get easier in the future, Jordan says. “I see a way forward where this becomes just normal construction,” he says. “It does not seem like rocket science. It just seems like, OK, well, you did this the first time. Let’s work out the kinks.” There are some other potential cost advantages to doing most of the work in a factory offsite. Labor in the Pennsylvania factory is less expensive. And crews can build the modular units year-round without delays because of bad weather. Jordan hopes that it also will become standard for larger affordable apartment buildings. “I think it really makes a lot of sense,” he says. “It’s just a matter of really getting the people who make the decisions comfortable with the idea of building a little bit differently than they’re used to . . . I think we all know that there’s a great need for affordable housing, and this is one of several tools that I think could be powerful in meeting that challenge.” fastcompany.com WWW.FASTCOMPANY.COM Edited March 25 by samhexum just for the hell of it BSR 1
samhexum Posted April 1 Posted April 1 DOES THIS QUALIFY? Two near lifesize sculptures found during excavations of Pompeii tomb The detailed relics were found in a necropolis and experts believe the woman depicted could have been an important priestess Two near lifesize sculptures found during excavations of Pompeii tomb | Italy | The Guardian WWW.THEGUARDIAN.COM The detailed relics were found in a necropolis and experts believe the woman depicted could have been...
samhexum Posted April 15 Posted April 15 The city’s zeal to enforce new environmental laws is set to crush the City’s middle-class housing stock under the weight of shockingly untenable fines. At issue is the implementation of Local Law 97, which was passed in 2019. The ambitious law sets emissions limits for buildings over 25,000 square feet, aiming to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030 and 80% by 2050. The goals of the law are commendable. But the implementation rollout is a disaster, putting the financial future of condo and cooperative owners all over the city in jeopardy. The City’s Department of Buildings is implementing the law and has rolled out a new filing system for coops and other buildings to submit their paperwork by the May 1 deadline. This deadline is entirely arbitrary, and so are many of the requirements DOB is forcing buildings all over the city to follow. Our co-op, Queensview, opened in 1950, and it has 14 buildings with 14 stories and a total of 726 apartments sitting on over 10 acres in Long Island City. Our buildings occupy about 20% of our acreage, with the remainder being greenspace, a children’s playground, a basketball/pickle ball court and parking lots. We have about 2,000 residents who are primarily middle-income, with a large population of retirees on fixed incomes. To start, buildings like ours are not allowed to use the existing square footage measurements that are on file with the city to calculate their liabilities under Local Law 97. Instead, we must hire consultants to take new measurements, which is essentially a make-work program for these high-priced companies. When you ask the DOB for clarification on their numerous rules, they are vague, if not unresponsive, forcing buildings to fend for themselves and take their best guess at what the requirements actually ask of them. Larger buildings and complexes with more resources may be able to navigate DOB’s new system, hire the consultants they need and get their filing in on time. But many buildings, especially smaller buildings with fewer residents and resources, may have to face the exorbitant late fees DOB has set. The DOB has set late filing fees for compliance with the law at $0.50 per square foot per month, the maximum amount allowed by law. An average 200-unit co-op or condo of 200,000+ square feet could face a monthly late fee of over $100,000, which is untenable for hundreds of thousands of homeowners across the economic spectrum. At Queensview alone that fine would total $317,520 per month. By one calculation, if every co-op building in New York City missed the May 1 deadline, DOB would collect $1 billion in fines in just one month. Plus, this money would not go to any greater environmental goal, just to the city’s general coffers. These fines, which could lead to financial ruin for individual owners and entire buildings alike, are looming over the collective heads of owners like myself. When we ask DOB to slow down, or for more guidance, or to lower the fines–for any assistance at all–we are smeared by the agency and supporters of Local Law 97 as anti-environment. That is certainly not true at Queensview. In the past three years alone, we have invested over $7 million on environmental upgrades, including new roofs, a community-wide real-time energy management system, efficiency upgrades to our heating system and more. Communities like ours all over the city are putting in similar work at their buildings. A new report by the Center for an Urban Future found that many owners of rental buildings across the City have decided it will be cheaper to pay some fines rather than electrify their buildings. That is not an option for a cooperative like Queensview and so many buildings like ours. We cannot put the future of thousands of residents by ignoring the law and the fines that come with it. All we are asking for is clarity from DOB, more time to allow cooperators to get their paperwork completed and a late fee schedule that is not so punitive as to be downright predatory. The city needs to support environmental justice without threatening thousands of New Yorkers with the loss of their homes. Alicia Fernandez is the treasurer of the Queensview cooperative apartment complex in Long Island City. Oh goody… I can see it now… A 24% maintenance increase along with 2 assessments in eleven months isn’t nearly enough… Op-ed: Local Law 97 set to cost co-op and condo owners millions (maybe billions!) in fees and fines – QNS QNS.COM The city's zeal to enforce new environmental laws is set to crush the City's middle-class housing stock with the... BSR 1
samhexum Posted April 16 Posted April 16 Renovation of Loft in Ex-Lax Bldg Pairs Refined Materials w/ Industrial Brawn One of Brooklyn’s first factory-to-residential conversion projects was completed in 1981 at the former Atlantic Avenue manufacturing facilities of Ex-Lax, the “excellent laxative” formulated with bite-size chocolate to make digestive stimulants more palatable to the masses. More than 40 years later, many of the 57 loft-style units in the six-story co-op are still in their ’80s-era-conversion state—remnants of the century-old building’s industrial past remain obscured by layers of drywall and stippled popcorn ceilings. In a project giving added meaning to the term gut renovation, Philipp and Kit von Dalwig of local architecture studio VonDalwig took a different approach in their revamp of a two-bedroom third-floor residence. Instead of further hiding or avoiding the 1,250-square-foot unit’s hulking structural bones—namely, two flared concrete pillars measuring roughly 25 inches by 26 inches at their base, VonDalwig integrates them into the open living plan as impossible-to-miss statement pieces that embrace the building’s history. “It was peeling off and starting from scratch—nothing [from the ’80s] was to be kept,” says Philipp of the process. Once concealed by drywall, one of the two colossal columns is now the focal point of a spacious open kitchen at the front of the residence that centers the main living space. Built around the unearthed column is a sculptural black-veined-marble island that serves as an informal dining and gathering place for the clients and their teenage daughter. “It has a strong geometry,” says Philipp of the island. “It’s partially open below, not this massive solid block, but there’s still enough counter space to accommodate a family of three.” Situated at a slant opposite the column-anchored island is a custom-designed white oak banquette for more formal sit-down meals—a striking material contrast to the kitchen’s freestanding raw-concrete and marble centerpiece. On the opposite wall, unpolished brass kitchen fixtures and hardware accentuate a closed and open-shelf cabinetry system in smoked ash. “A lot of 1980s conversions have tight, galley-style kitchens tucked away in the back,” says Kit, noting that the existing plumbing stacks proved to be the only truly restrictive element of the renovation. “We opened this kitchen up, and mixed refined materials with the rough and industrial.” The second column straddles what is now a laundry nook and the primary bathroom, which includes a double sink in the same marble as the kitchen island, a walk-in shower, and a wood shelving unit tucked between the wall and the column’s raw concrete face. Near the entrance to the unit, a smaller bathroom—it features a tub and fixtures mirroring those in the kitchen—may lack a signature concrete column but did play a key role in initiating the project. The clients’ previous home in the same building had one bathroom; as their daughter entered her teens, it became clear that upgrading to a larger unit with a second bathroom would be beneficial. Much like the health remedy once manufactured in the Ex-Lax building, VonDalwig’s renovation combines functionality with good taste. Achieving this balance was made easier by generous confidence placed in the architects by their clients. “We had an existing relationship with them and, so, didn’t have to battle with trust issues,” says Philipp. “And their daughter was just the right age to have her own bathroom—that part was a huge relief.” A second bathroom is situated off the entrance. Cost: Withheld Size: 1,250 square feet Completion Date: April 2023 VonDalwig’s Renovation of a Loft in Brooklyn’s Ex-Lax Building Pairs Refined Materials with Industrial Brawn WWW.ARCHITECTURALRECORD.COM BSR and Lotus-eater 1 1
Lotus-eater Posted April 18 Posted April 18 (edited) On 4/16/2025 at 9:33 AM, samhexum said: “A lot of 1980s conversions have tight, galley-style kitchens tucked away in the back,” says Kit, noting that the existing plumbing stacks proved to be the only truly restrictive element of the renovation. “We opened this kitchen up, and mixed refined materials with the rough and industrial.” They got it right in the 1980s. I don't want to see the kitchen from the main living areas. I doubt whether Lady Violet ever entered the kitchen. Edited April 18 by Lotus-eater
samhexum Posted April 21 Posted April 21 The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’s NYC Apartment For Sale After Decades Off-Market — Take a Look Inside $1.75M Home TVLINE.COM The real-life 'Marvelous Mrs. Maisel' home is for sale! Find out how much it'll cost you to live in the residence...
marylander1940 Posted April 23 Posted April 23 Alabama’s largest house is for sale, and it can be yours for $5 million WWW.AL.COM The mansion is the 44th largest in the United States. Lotus-eater 1
samhexum Posted April 23 Posted April 23 16 minutes ago, marylander1940 said: Alabama’s largest house is for sale, and it can be yours for $5 million WWW.AL.COM The mansion is the 44th largest in the United States. are we to assume this means you're in the market for a pied-a-terre? marylander1940 1
+ azdr0710 Posted April 24 Posted April 24 4 hours ago, marylander1940 said: Alabama’s largest house is for sale, and it can be yours for $5 million WWW.AL.COM The mansion is the 44th largest in the United States. $92/sq ft......strangely low-priced?.......is it just some combination of the location/demand/silliness?! marylander1940 1
marylander1940 Posted April 24 Posted April 24 6 minutes ago, azdr0710 said: $92/sq ft......strangely low-priced?.......is it just some combination of the location/demand/silliness?! It's the Bible belt! + azdr0710 1
samhexum Posted April 25 Posted April 25 (edited) Breaking news: Two New York City news anchors are saying goodbye to their Brooklyn pad. Mike Marza and Rhiannon Ally have listed their Park Slope co-op for $1.5 million. The move comes as the broadcast couple continues to cement their careers in New York City’s fast-paced news market at ABC. Marza serves as a weeknight 11 p.m. co-anchor and field reporter for WABC’s Eyewitness News, while Ally anchors for ABC, including a notable role on GMA3, where she filled in for Amy Robach during a widely reported absence tied to Robach’s personal controversy with co-anchor T.J. Holmes. The couple purchased the 1,500-square-foot, four-bedroom, two-bath duplex in 2022 for $1.46 million, property records show. For them, the best feature of all is something much bigger. “Brooklyn is the best of both worlds,” Marza told The Post via email. “You’re in the city, but also have a little room to breathe too. Prospect Park is our backyard. We taught all three kids to ride bikes there. We love the location of this apartment. It’s really a special place, with the views from the incredible rooftop and the world famous restaurants just steps away.” Ally echoed the sentiment, adding they’re not going far at all because of it. “Our family loves Brooklyn because every street feels like home,” she said, also by email. “Each neighborhood has its own personality. Park Slope is the perfect intersection of energy and community —it’s where laughter echoes from every stoop and every building like [ours] has its own unique history. Neighbors look out for each other and start to feel like family. We are thrilled to raise our kids here and aren’t going far. We are moving just a few blocks away.” Situated in a converted industrial building, the co-op blends historic elements with modern design. The listing highlights its soaring double-height ceilings, a distinctive spiral staircase and a multi-level layout that offers flexibility for various living arrangements. The updated kitchen is equipped with stainless steel appliances, a large island with seating and ample storage, the listing notes. The upper level includes three spacious bedrooms, one configured as a home office. A removable wall between two bedrooms allows for the creation of a larger primary suite, while the third bedroom features a loft area adaptable for multiple purposes. Additional features include dimmable lighting, an in-unit washer-dryer, and a virtual doorman system for added convenience and security. Residents have access to a communal roof deck offering panoramic views of the Manhattan skyline. Abigail Palanca, Jennifer Chiu and Crystal Chancey with Serhant hold the listing. Said Palanca, “The architectural style of Park Slope is relatively uniform and this co-op is a contemporary outlier. Owners get access to the picturesque, tree-lined streets and community feel of the beloved neighborhood while having a modern duplex space that can be further customized as they wish.” Edited April 25 by samhexum because he's bored as hell
Lotus-eater Posted April 25 Posted April 25 45 minutes ago, samhexum said: Breaking news: Two New York City news anchors are saying goodbye to their Brooklyn pad. Mike Marza and Rhiannon Ally have listed their Park Slope co-op for $1.5 million. The move comes as the broadcast couple continues to cement their careers in New York City’s fast-paced news market at ABC. Marza serves as a weeknight 11 p.m. co-anchor and field reporter for WABC’s Eyewitness News, while Ally anchors for ABC, including a notable role on GMA3, where she filled in for Amy Robach during a widely reported absence tied to Robach’s personal controversy with co-anchor T.J. Holmes. The couple purchased the 1,500-square-foot, four-bedroom, two-bath duplex in 2022 for $1.46 million, property records show. For them, the best feature of all is something much bigger. “Brooklyn is the best of both worlds,” Marza told The Post via email. “You’re in the city, but also have a little room to breathe too. Prospect Park is our backyard. We taught all three kids to ride bikes there. We love the location of this apartment. It’s really a special place, with the views from the incredible rooftop and the world famous restaurants just steps away.” Ally echoed the sentiment, adding they’re not going far at all because of it. “Our family loves Brooklyn because every street feels like home,” she said, also by email. “Each neighborhood has its own personality. Park Slope is the perfect intersection of energy and community —it’s where laughter echoes from every stoop and every building like [ours] has its own unique history. Neighbors look out for each other and start to feel like family. We are thrilled to raise our kids here and aren’t going far. We are moving just a few blocks away.” Situated in a converted industrial building, the co-op blends historic elements with modern design. The listing highlights its soaring double-height ceilings, a distinctive spiral staircase and a multi-level layout that offers flexibility for various living arrangements. The updated kitchen is equipped with stainless steel appliances, a large island with seating and ample storage, the listing notes. The upper level includes three spacious bedrooms, one configured as a home office. A removable wall between two bedrooms allows for the creation of a larger primary suite, while the third bedroom features a loft area adaptable for multiple purposes. Additional features include dimmable lighting, an in-unit washer-dryer, and a virtual doorman system for added convenience and security. Residents have access to a communal roof deck offering panoramic views of the Manhattan skyline. Abigail Palanca, Jennifer Chiu and Crystal Chancey with Serhant hold the listing. Said Palanca, “The architectural style of Park Slope is relatively uniform and this co-op is a contemporary outlier. Owners get access to the picturesque, tree-lined streets and community feel of the beloved neighborhood while having a modern duplex space that can be further customized as they wish.” Stark contrast: "Spacious" 1,500 sq ft at $1,000/sq ft in NYC v. 54,000 sq ft at $92/sq ft in suburban Alabama. samhexum and + azdr0710 1 1
Lotus-eater Posted April 25 Posted April 25 Costa Rica’s Most Expensive Home Is This $30 Million Mansion Overlooking the Gulf of Papagayo ROBBREPORT.COM The Astor Mansion at The St. Regis Papagayo Resort is set to become Costa Rica’s priciest listing, with three pools... samhexum 1
samhexum Posted April 30 Posted April 30 not sure if this belongs here, or in 'Hanging out in Queens'... A tenant who hasn’t paid her $100-a-month rent in more than a decade is back in court, fighting to hold on to the two-bedroom Queens apartment she inherited through a controversial death-bed adoption, The Post has learned. Maria DeTommaso, 74, has lived in the rent-controlled railroad flat on the bottom floor of a Long Island City row house since at least 2002, where neighbors say she causes many problems. “I think she’s a demon in human skin because of what she puts people through,” said Anjanie Narine, who has lived next door to DeTommaso for more than 20 years. “Every interaction with her is negative. She terrorizes everyone, and acts as if she owns the building.” DeTommaso scored her sweet rent deal when she moved in with an elderly former dock worker, Nicholas “Nicky” DeTommaso, who had the original lease on the apartment. Days before he died in 2009, the then 58-year-old Maria convinced the 85-year-old retiree to adopt her. Nine years later, the state’s Division of Housing and Community Renewal granted DeTommaso “successor rights” to the apartment, keeping its rent at $100 and allowing her to stay in perpetuity. Similar units in the building now rent just below $2,000. During the time she has lived in the unit, neighbors say she has “terrorized” them by renting out part of the apartment on Airbnb, ushering in a steady stream of dozens of tourists from around the world who rented rooms from her for $55 a night, according to complaints made to the Department of Buildings and online ads. One longtime fellow tenant in the six-unit building said DeTommaso, who is also known as Pamela Becker and Prema Deodhar, has even changed the locks on the front doors and invited a steady stream of veterans from a nearby shelter who have caused havoc in the building. For years, The Post has documented attempts by the building’s octogenarian owners, Sugrim and Kowsila Outar, to evict DeTommaso from the apartment. They are scheduled to return to Queens Housing Court on May 6. “Her case has already gone through five of the judges here in Queens, and benefited from every change in the housing laws since COVID,” said Elan Layliev, the attorney for the Outars who is fighting to evict DeTommasso. “[It’s been] a wild ride. Ms. DeTommaso has utilized every loophole in the court system to prolong and delay this trial.” For her part, DeTommaso told The Post last week the claims against her are exaggerated and designed to kick her out of her home. “I won the succession,” she said. “This is sick. I’m the legal tenant. I have every right to be here and I don’t know how people can lie so much. They are trying to evict me, but my lawyer says I don’t have to worry.” DeTommaso’s lawyer, Zara Feingold, is a legal aid attorney who works with the New York Legal Assistance Group, according to court documents and her LinkedIn page, which means DeTommaso doesn’t have to pay her for representation. Under New York law, she also doesn’t have to pay rent while the legal case with her landlords is ongoing, which is currently a decade. Still, she has previously said she puts rent money into an escrow account so it can be paid after the legal matter is settled. DeTommaso, who lives with her two dogs — a miniature grey hound and a dachshund — told The Post she recently broke her hip in the apartment because the landlords have not done necessary repairs. She said her oven doesn’t work, and complained about roaches and mice in the living space. However, according to Layliev, DeTommasso will not allow workers contracted by the Outars into her apartment and has previously hired homeless veterans to do the work and told them to present the bills to the owners. DeTommasso was born Pamela Rose Becker on March 1, 1951. She grew up in Washington DC and attended a series of posh private schools. Her father served as US ambassador to Honduras during the Ford administration and her brother, Ralph Becker, is a former mayor of Salt Lake City. A yoga enthusiast, she showed up at the Long Island City building to cat sit for a friend in the late 1990s. When the friend returned, she claimed she had nowhere to live and asked Nicky if she could spend a few days, said Narine. She never left. Nicky, who was known in the neighborhood as “Uncle Nicky,” had moved to the apartment in 1924 as an infant. He lived there with his mother, three brothers and two sisters, and stayed until his death on July 15, 2009. A devoted “Star Trek” fan, he played stickball on the street when he was a child and chain-smoked cigarettes on the stoop, helping his neighbors secure parking spots when he was older, according to “Nicky D from LIC: A Narrative Portrait” by writer and artist Warren Lehrer. Five years after moving in, DeTommasso secured Nicky’s power of attorney in 2007. When his health was in decline, she drove him around the city to do errands and to see his doctor in a series of cars he bought for her, according to an interview with The Post in 2018. “He loved me, and his whole family still calls me,” said DeTommaso last week. But Narine, an office worker, said she recalled Nicky had allegedly tried to kick her out almost as soon as she moved in. “He woke up early, and every morning I would hear him curse at her to get the f–k out,” she said. “I’m next door and the walls are pretty thin.” The protracted battle with the Outars, immigrants from Guyana who also live in the building, has taken its toll on the elderly couple, claimed Narine, adding that Sugrim Outar, 85, has had several heart attacks over the years. “They are both physically weak,” said Narine. “I have no doubt in my mind this battle with this professional squatter has taken years off their lives.” Lotus-eater 1
samhexum Posted June 6 Posted June 6 Tamara Peterson and her Pomeranian, Levi, are currently the sole occupants of the 58th floor of Brooklyn Tower. Peterson, an executive assistant for someone she describes as an “ultrahigh-net-worth individual,” moved into her one-bedroom, one-and-a-half-bath more than a year ago but still hasn’t taken a dip in the pool that wraps around the Guastavino dome of the Dimes Savings Bank or let Levi loose on the “world’s highest dog run” on the 66th floor — neither has opened. As she waits for the opulent, 80,000-square-foot Life Time “athletic club” to open in the base of the building, she has been given a free membership to use the chain’s other locations. Sure, there are delays, Peterson says, but Silverstein Capital Partners — which took over the building from JDS Development last summer in a $672 million foreclosure settlement — has been reasonable about the whole thing. In addition to the amenity work-arounds, she has received “generous” reductions in her common charges (ostensibly because there’s not yet much to charge for). “They’ve done stuff for us,” she says. “They know they’re not finished.” Which is perhaps an understatement: It has been a rocky couple of years at Brooklyn’s first supertall with just 23 of the 143 condos selling in the 93-story neo-Gothic skyscraper, meaning near-empty elevator rides and an indefinite delay for residents eyeing a condo-board seat. Sales relaunched in June under Silverstein’s watch, with Corcoran Sunshine taking over the project from Douglas Elliman Development Marketing, but the question remains: Will anyone buy? “It always leaves a stench,” Compass broker Maggie Marshall says of the early sales slump, which she, like nearly every other broker I spoke to, blames in large part on pricing. Still, she says, these things tend to turn around one way or another: “It’s not like you’re going to have a building sitting empty for the next 300 years. It’ll fill up; it just depends on what structure, rental or condo.” The tower, once characterized by its previous developer, Michael Stern, as “a symbol of Brooklyn’s unceasing drive and ambition,” is a test case in a neighborhood largely known, until recently, for civic drudgery and a bleak Macy’s (RIP). Would buyers be willing to drop millions to live above Junior’s if the building came with enough Billionaires Row–style amenities and finishes? “If you look at the Brooklyn real-estate market as a whole, downtown Brooklyn is always kind of a fallback to other neighborhoods,” says Brown Harris Stevens broker Ari Harkov. “It’s hard to take what is a fallback neighborhood and achieve a top-tier price.” And the prices are top tier. Condos, restricted to the upper half of the spire, with its blackened-steel and bronze design by SHoP Architects, were initially priced up to $8 million for a four-bedroom. Dropping the same amount of cash in nearby Brooklyn Heights could get you a seven-bedroom townhouse. “Obviously, the building has amenities and services and views, things you can’t get in a four-story walk-up in Park Slope,” Harkov says, “but at the end of the day, there’s a smaller buyer pool that wants to make that trade.” The financial drama that roiled the building last year hasn’t helped. In the spring of 2022, after nearly a decade of planning and construction, Stern’s JDS Development began listing sales. A year later, the first tenants began to move into the tower’s 398 leased units — a combination of market rate and affordable — around the same time JDS put its rentals and roughly 130,000 square feet of retail space on the market. The developer hoped to find a buyer willing to pay north of $600 million for the package, but none emerged and condo sales proved glacial. In March 2024, JDS defaulted on its $240 million mezzanine loan from Silverstein Capital Partners, which had also purchased the developer’s $424 million senior mortgage from Otéra Capital. Silverstein moved to foreclose, and both sides settled to avoid seeing the building go up for auction, with JDS transferring complete ownership in July. But it’s not as if there isn’t a luxury market in Brooklyn. Compass broker Ryan Garson cited 11 Hoyt as a success story and once again pointed to pricing as Brooklyn Tower’s main problem. So something eventually has to give: Either prices come down in some fashion or Silverstein could resort to leasing the condo units to stanch the bleeding, at least until the market shifts in its favor. It’s a familiar story. Donna Olshan, who tracks Manhattan’s luxury market, says this kind of stall out hardly means the project will fail. She has seen plenty of buildings come out of the ashes, citing One High Line as an example of something that just sat until it didn’t. The handful of owners I talked to — buyers, many on the younger end of the spectrum, range from consultants, doctors, and finance types to anonymous LLCs — seems to be floating above the industry chatter. Adam Chang moved from Jersey City early last year after picking up a one-bedroom, one-bath for $1.3 million. He’s got “quite nice” views of Fort Greene Park and the New York Harbor from his Gachot Studios–designed unit, he says, and has been a regular at the Trader Joe’s across the street. He loves the “super-friendly” building staff, who have helped him move furniture and even haul a fridge up to his apartment. As to the dozens of unsold units sitting empty just a few stories above him? “There’s fewer people in the elevator, but I don’t know who’s complaining about that.” (Shawn Katz, president of Silverstein Capital Partners, says the company is looking forward to completing construction on the building and its amenities for current and future residents.) Life in a supertall ghost town has some other unexpected perks, residents say. Nosy neighbors have been able to poke around unlocked units, snooping to see how their views compare with the penthouses’. And with no strangers passing through the hallways to bark at, Peterson says Levi has been extra-quiet lately. “It’s quite peaceful up here.”
Lotus-eater Posted June 6 Posted June 6 (edited) Richard Simmons’s L.A. House in Photos ROBBREPORT.COM The late fitness guru’s longtime home in the Hollywood Hills is now on the market for $7 million. Edited June 6 by Lotus-eater samhexum 1
+ nycman Posted June 6 Posted June 6 1 hour ago, Lotus-eater said: Richard Simmons’s L.A. House in Photos ROBBREPORT.COM The late fitness guru’s longtime home in the Hollywood Hills is now on the market for $7 million. God, that is one ugly interior design. + azdr0710, Lotus-eater and samhexum 3
+ azdr0710 Posted June 12 Posted June 12 (edited) ostensibly, a 1966 un-remodeled, impeccably-maintained, one-owner home set for demo......based on the appearance of the unusually large neighboring homes, I think this is an upscale tear-down neighborhood and this house's time has come......the narrator sounds Canadian, but I don't know what town/city this is in (I didn't look amid the 3000 comments too much)..... Edited June 12 by azdr0710 + MysticMenace and + nycman 2
Lotus-eater Posted July 2 Posted July 2 Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fountainhead House in Photos ROBBREPORT.COM Designed in the 1950s by the legendary architect, the Usonian-style home in the Mississippi city of Jackson is... + azdr0710, thomas, + nycman and 1 other 4
samhexum Posted July 3 Posted July 3 I know it's sacrilegious to say, but yuck! 2 hours ago, Lotus-eater said: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fountainhead House in Photos ROBBREPORT.COM Designed in the 1950s by the legendary architect, the Usonian-style home in the Mississippi city of Jackson is... thomas, CuriousByNature and Luv2play 2 1
+ nycman Posted July 3 Posted July 3 1 hour ago, samhexum said: I know it's sacrilegious to say, but yuck! Heathen! It’s a Masterpiece! CuriousByNature, mike carey, thomas and 2 others 1 2 2
samhexum Posted July 10 Posted July 10 What began as a simple, innocuous phone notification this spring evolved quickly into a real estate mystery and multimillion-dollar legal dispute for Issaquah property owners accused of illegally chopping and stripping dozens of trees on public land. Stumps and barren trunks jut into the sky where once stood a thick copse of Douglas fir, western red cedar, Sitka spruce, hemlocks and maples. The cut extends well into King County’s Grand Ridge Park. The thinning is so apparent, a new hole in the forest can be seen from Interstate 90. What remains is a much clearer line of sight between three mansions on the hill and the mountains to the south. The people who own the properties are no secret. Four of them work in real estate and the fifth is running for public office on Mercer Island. But who was hired to clear these decades-old trees and why the work cut so deeply into public property remains unclear. County officials don’t yet know and the property owners aren’t saying. One is, however, distancing herself from the cuttings entirely while another is defending the work. Attorneys for King County filed a lawsuit on June 6 against all five property owners. The suit, filed in Superior Court of Washington for King County, cites millions of dollars in damages. For the company (or companies) behind the cuttings, county lawyers listed only pseudonyms. The King County sheriff’s office is also investigating the case to determine whether criminal charges are warranted. Nearby homeowner Alex Brown alerted county officials to the cutting this spring. When one natural resources officer visited the scene, he said they told him it amounted to a “massacre” and the “most egregious vandalism” of this kind they’d ever seen. The illegally cut and damaged trees leave behind serious and generational harm to a protected natural area, County Parks Director Warren Jimenez said in a statement. Not only did the property owners cut into large trees themselves, they cut into a sensitive and hazardous habitat, exposing the steep hillside and surrounding ecosystem to risk well into the future. “This kind of damage undermines decades of public investment in environmental conservation and responsible land management, and we are committed to holding accountable those who violate the public’s trust and damage our shared natural resources,” Jimenez said. While Brown and other neighbors expressed concern over the cuttings and their personal safety downhill, the defendants themselves have offered little information. King County officials continue to investigate and attorneys are seeking a jury trial to determine the full extent of the damage. Brown moved into his rural Issaquah home about two years ago and especially loves the access to the wilds of the Pacific Northwest. He’s an experienced thru-hiker and trail runner, and he hunts and fishes. He also keeps a trail camera in a small, sloped clearing about 75 yards behind his house to track wildlife. That area is a remote section of King County’s Grand Ridge Park. Alerts pop up on Brown’s phone intermittently, letting him know the camera detected movement and sending him a single photo of the footage captured. Sometimes he’ll see bears, coyotes, even mountain lions. He’s started a blog and contributes to a local YouTube channel to share the video clips and his musings. In late March, Brown said he received a different type of photo: What appeared to be a fallen tree. That’s funny, he thought. If a tree falls in the forest … You know the saying. The footage was no laughing matter, though. Brown watched as a large log, stripped of its branches, barreled down the steep hillside like a missile. It wedged itself under another, larger log just steps from the trail cam. Footage from Alex Brown’s trail camera shows a large log, stripped of its branches, barreled down the steep hillside like a missile in King County’s Grand Ridge Park. The video set off a multi-million-dollar legal dispute for Issaquah property owners accused of illegally chopping and stripping dozens of trees on public land. Brown, a journalist, followed the clues. From the log’s final resting place, he could see a path of destruction leading all the way up the steep slope, toward an expensive and private development off Issaquah’s Grand Ridge Drive. He and a fellow neighbor scrambled up the incline, through spider webs and what began as a simple, innocuous phone notification this spring evolved quickly into a real estate mystery and multimillion-dollar legal dispute for Issaquah property owners accused of illegally chopping and stripping dozens of trees on public land. At the top they found more destruction than they anticipated. Dozens of trees had been slashed and sawed. Some had been cut down entirely, others were stripped of their branches except for small tufts up high. Others still had been “topped,” or cut higher up the trunk. “My jaw dropped,” Brown said. In the background sat three mansions and manicured lawns. Brown said he approached one of the property owners, Sam Cunningham, about the cuts and received apologies. He said Cunningham (who did not respond to a request for comment for this story) told him that another neighbor had hired a “licensed, bonded arborist” on behalf of the property owners. This was a case of an arborist going rogue and exceeding their brief — they had specifically not been authorized to cut county park trees, Cunningham reportedly told Brown. The uphill neighbor asked Brown to allow those up top to take the lead on reporting the incident to the county. But Brown and his neighbors contacted the county themselves. Attorneys for King County filed a lawsuit on June 6 against all five property owners. The suit, filed in Superior Court of Washington for King County, cites millions of dollars in damages. For the company (or companies) behind the cuttings, county lawyers listed only pseudonyms. The King County sheriff’s office is also investigating the case to determine whether criminal charges are warranted. Nearby homeowner Alex Brown alerted county officials to the cutting this spring. When one natural resources officer visited the scene, he said they told him it amounted to a “massacre” and the “most egregious vandalism” of this kind they’d ever seen. The illegally cut and damaged trees leave behind serious and generational harm to a protected natural area, County Parks Director Warren Jimenez said in a statement. Not only did the property owners cut into large trees themselves, they cut into a sensitive and hazardous habitat, exposing the steep hillside and surrounding ecosystem to risk well into the future. “This kind of damage undermines decades of public investment in environmental conservation and responsible land management, and we are committed to holding accountable those who violate the public’s trust and damage our shared natural resources,” Jimenez said. While Brown and other neighbors expressed concern over the cuttings and their personal safety downhill, the defendants themselves have offered little information. King County officials continue to investigate and attorneys are seeking a jury trial to determine the full extent of the damage. Revisiting the site in June and climbing between cut logs, Brown examined the debris left behind. He remains highly skeptical that such widespread damage could have been an accident. “You’d have to have so much skill and so much manpower to pull this off,” he said. Investigating county officials spray-painted large, orange numbers on the trees and stumps cut on county property. One by one the numbers tick upward, tallying the damage. In all, 72 trees were stripped of their limbs, 45 cut down, 18 topped and seven more damaged in some other way. One hundred and forty two in total. More trees were cut and damaged on private land, and county officials confirmed no clearing permits had been issued for any of the three properties in question. Stop work orders are now stapled to several remaining trees in the park. County attorneys filed their lawsuit in early June, listing Cunningham, his wife, Laura Brice Cunningham, Vlad and Jessica Popach and Julie Hsieh as defendants. The Cunninghams and Popaches work in real estate and Hsieh is running for Mercer Island City Council. The suit accuses the defendants and unknown companies of multiple trespassing counts, damage to public land, negligence, and damage to environmentally critical lands at risk of landslide or erosion. County attorneys estimate the damage adds up to about $2.3 million. State law allows for such damages to be tripled in these cases, which would bring the total to nearly $7 million. Pending additional costs for restoration, emotional damage, arborist fees and court costs should also be tripled, the complaint says. While the cuttings damaged King County land, they likely increased the property values for the homes at the top of the hill by improving their views of nearby mountains, the attorneys argue. Damages to be determined in a trial should consider this boost in equity, the complaint says. Similar cases have settled for far less. The city of Seattle brought a similar lawsuit against West Seattle homeowners in 2017 after they destroyed more than 150 trees there. The city agreed to settle for $440,000 and offered one family immunity from criminal charges in exchange for naming other property owners involved. Hsieh pushed back strongly against the allegations within the lawsuit and her involvement. She lives on Mercer Island but served as the registered agent for her parents’ corporation (also listed as a defendant in the lawsuit) through which they bought the Issaquah home. Her parents closed on the house earlier in March and hadn’t yet moved in when the cuttings took place, she said. Never before had the family met the Popaches or Cunninghams, Hsieh said in a text. “Still don’t know them,” she said. “Now there’s a gaping hole with a few damaged trees where there used to be beautiful trees.” “My family got dragged into this,” she added. Hsieh said she hopes those who “committed this terrible act” are brought to swift justice. Vlad Popach confirmed Hsieh was not involved. Many of the other details he provided, though, raised more questions. Popach said in an email exchange this week the remaining property owners wanted to cut the trees because he believed they posed a threat to the homes in question, citing widespread wind damage from windstorms last winter. Popach acknowledged he knew the arborists would be cutting on King County land. The neighbors had called county officials to discuss the matter and received “verbal permission” greenlighting the cuttings, he said. But Popach said he doesn’t remember the name of the county official who gave the permission. As for the cuttings on private property, Popach said he does not believe permits were needed and that none of the work was carried out to improve the views for these homes, he said. As the county’s lawsuit moves forward, officials declined to comment on the case further. Popach refused to name those who might be able to back up his claims: the arborists. Caitlin McNulty and her husband moved to the area about 18 months ago with their infant son and they live not far from Brown. McNulty’s husband was actually the one who scrambled up the hill with Brown. They’re displeased and frightened by the cuttings. What if that falling log hadn’t been stopped on its way down the hill, McNulty wonders. It might have hurt somebody or even kept going all the way to I-90. Trees in the area are susceptible to high winds, she said. But the trees that were cut sat downslope from the homes in question and also were hundreds of feet away from them. “You want to feel like your neighbors have your back,” McNulty said. “It makes me feel even worse that they’re pretending to be safe while actively putting my family in danger.” The area is prone to landslides, McNulty said. That sort of risk can be mitigated by trees anchoring soils to the mountainside. And these trees belonged to the county, so they should have been protected. But now, many of them have been cut or damaged and McNulty wants a slope assessment to determine whether the landslide risk has increased. Yes, the mysterious crews physically cut these trees, McNulty said. But she holds the people who hired them more responsible for the damage.
samhexum Posted July 21 Posted July 21 A Route 66 ghost town was ‘frozen in time’. Is it on the brink of a comeback? APPLE.NEWS Newberry Springs was almost lost to the desert. But as America’s ‘mother road’ turns 100, locals see hope... Lotus-eater 1
samhexum Posted July 22 Posted July 22 Looking into a basement apartment? NYC proposes new safety rules. - Gothamist GOTHAMIST.COM Experts say that without proper implementation, new rules for basement and cellar units could push... Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of New Yorkers live in basement and cellar apartments, according to research by universities and nonprofits. And yet, many of these units are illegal, largely because they pose risks to tenants during fires or floods. In 2021, when the remnants of Hurricane Ida dumped more than 8 inches of rain onto some parts of New York City, 11 people died in flooded basement apartments. At the same time, the city is in the grips of a housing crisis, and outlawing underground dwellings might only exacerbate the problem. That's why city officials proposed new rules for basement units late last week as part of an ongoing effort to keep residents safe without placing a heavy burden on homeowners to make their buildings compliant. If approved, the rules for what the city calls "ancillary dwelling units" would introduce an array of safety regulations, including a prohibition on basement and cellar apartments in flood-prone areas. Owners would also have to live in the buildings where the apartments are located. New regulations are also being proposed for other types of units, including attics and backyard cottages. The city defines basement units as dwellings that are more than halfway above curb level and cellar units as dwellings that are more than halfway below curb level. Under the proposed rules, any cellar unit would have to be equipped with two exits and an automatic sprinkler system. Yards or any other adjacent open spaces must be at least 6 inches lower than any window sills in a unit.
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