Tag: waterfront

The Edge’s New Math – Now Over 50% Sold!

04/05/2011 | Comment

Earlier this week, I questioned the numeracy of the Edge’s PR team. This was based on an article in the Brooklyn Eagle, which said the Edge was “approaching 50 percent sold” with only 160 of 565 units sold (which works out to 28% sold in the real world).

Today, Brownstoner reports that the Edge has sent out a press release announcing that they are now over 50% sold. Sounds like a good week for the Edge.

Well, not that good.

The latest numbers include contracts signed as well as closings (presumably the Eagle’s numbers should have included contracts as well). Adding contracts (100) to closings (165 now), the Edge says that it has “sold” 53% of its 500 units.

So, if you count your chickens before they hatch and lower your denominator, you too can increase your sales from 28% to 53% in a matter of days!

(Clearly, it is the Eagle’s math I should have been questioning, not the Edge’s.)

Williamsburg Waterfront Projects Reborn

Interesting (as in reality-challenged) take on the state of the Williamsburg waterfront by Crain’s:

The seven-block stretch of Kent Avenue running from North Third Street up to North 10th along the waterfront in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, is making a comeback. Activity on the strip—which became one of the borough’s hottest areas for residential development during the boom years, and something of a ghost town during the recession—is picking up again.

With the exception of 111 Kent (the zig-zag condo at North 7th and Kent), there wasn’t a single stalled project on the Williamsburg waterfront. 175 Kent started post-boom, and has been progressing steadily; same with 157 Kent, the skinny condo next door to the north. For the record, 80 Metropolitan, 56 Metropolitan, 175 Kent, 184 Kent, 157 Kent, Northside Piers 2, Edge South and Edge North were all constructed during the recession; Northside 1 and North 8 were finished before the recession (and 184 Kent was a condo-cum-rental well before the bust).

Four years after the opening of the Northside Piers luxury high-rise—the first of Toll Brothers Inc.’s planned three-building complex—55% of the 180 units are sold or in contract. Sales also are perking up next door at The Edge, where deals on 160 of the 565 units have closed and 100 are in contract.

I had to check the dateline on the article, but it really is April, 2011 (and not April 1). Clearly the numbers they are running for Northside Piers are for tower #2, which opened in 2010; tower #1 (was it really finished four years ago?) sold out long ago.

(At the Edge, the innumeracy seems to run in the opposite direction – according to their math (swallowed whole by the Eagle):

160 / 565 = .5

(OK, they did say “almost” 50% – I guess 28%, rounded up, is closer to 50% than 0%).)

Things are looking up on the waterfront in other ways too:

other pieces of the new residential strip are also coming together—including a soccer field in Bushwick Inlet Park along the waterfront, which is expected to be available to the public shortly.

Who were all those people playing on the field all last summer??

To reach trendy restaurants and hip bars, however, the new crowd still must walk over to Bedford Avenue or North Sixth Street and mingle with the old crowd.

OK – you didn’t really go to Williamsburg, did you? Maybe this really is an April 1 dateline after all.

RIP Brooklyn Night Bazaar

The organizer behind this Brooklyn Night Bazaar concept has decided not to go forward with the project this year. I was actually supposed to meet with him yesterday morning, but got a call that the whole thing was being put off until next year. Hopefully next time around he’ll have a better organized (and communicated) plan in place – after hearing from opponents and supporters and reading through everything that the organizer published, I still have no idea whether or not this was a serious endeavor, what it really was (a market? a concert venue? an open-air night club?), and what the impact on/benefit for the neighborhood was.

I guess we’ll see.

Two Northside Piers is 50% Sold

I keep hearing about how great sales are at the Edge, but next door, Toll Brothers’ Northside Piers project is quietly selling a lot of units.

Two Northside Piers, the second phase of the much better-looking waterfront development, is now 50% sold (one Northside Piers sold out ages ago). If my numbers (and theirs) are correct, Northside has sold more than 310 of about market-rate 450 units, or about 69% overall. Next door, the Edge has sold about 38% (“nearly 40%”!) of its 565 market-rate units.