Corcoran report: Residential buyers looking to Brooklyn

Real Estate Weekly, Feb 20, 2002

"With the market in Manhattan continuing at a frenzied pace, buyers are turning to Brooklyn for the opportunity to invest in a market that shows signs of continued strength in price growth but remains affordable," says Melinda Magnett, president of the Corcoran Group Brooklyn. The Corcoran Group Brooklyn's Year End Numbers show that every neighborhood in Brooklyn experienced substantial price growth and the upward trend of the Brooklyn market shows no sign of cooling.

Highlights of the Corcoran Brooklyn Report include:

* Prices for cooperative apartments achieved record levels in 2001, up an average 28%. Condominiums and townhouses also saw double-digit gains in most areas.

* Brooklyn Heights remains the most expensive neighborhood with an average coop sales price of $349,000.

* Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens boast a strong year in almost every category of the market. The coop market showed robust growth with an average increase of 23%.

* Buyers discovered Fort Greene and Clinton Hill with a vengeance in 2001. Although these areas continue to be Brooklyn's most affordable, they also experienced the strongest advances in coop prices, up 28% with the average sales price of one bedroom co-ops at $148,000.

* The growing popularity of Park Slope drove prices for all properties in that market dramatically higher, with the average sale price of a single-family home reaching $970,000.

* Townhouses both single family homes and multi-unit performed well in 2001. This was particularly true in Cobble Hill/Carroll Gardens and Park Slope where the average price for single-family townhouses hovered around $1 million.