Brooklyn Home Prices Reached a New, Incredibly Depressing High This Year
The average Brooklyn home-owner
Everyone knows the rent–and the mortgage–is too damn high in Brooklyn; the days of writing out a monthly check for anything less than one thousand big ones are gone (even if the days of writing paper checks, mystifyingly, are not). And based on a third quarter housing report published by Douglass Elliman, and reported by DNAinfo, it’s pretty evident that we’re now firmly in Scrooge McDuck (aka the cartoon character most likely to drown in a swimming pool of gold coins) territory now: The cost of homes in Brooklyn rose 18 percent over the last year, bringing just the average cost to $856,839.
More statistics to make you cry: listings—the actual number of places available for purchase—fell by 14 percent; inadequate supply in Brooklyn and Queens made housing prices in Westchester reach a 34-year high; condos in the highly pleasant neighborhoods of Carroll Gardens, Boerum Hill, and Red Hook were victim to the greatest median increases—a whopping 46 percent—or a total of $1.45 million; finally, because the market, to meet demand, increasingly caters to the rental market, rather than to buyers, this overall trend won’t change any time soon.
So what’s the lesson here, kids? Maybe this: Consider not moving here. I took a road trip and passed through Omaha recently. There were four coffee shops that brewed beans to rival any bean roasted in Brooklyn. I bought two cocktails for a total of nine dollars (combined), and saw an entire sail boat stashed in a front yard less than a quarter of a mile outside of downtown—and it looked like someone used it, mysteriously, somewhere. Omaha has the Internet, too. Your Etsy business does not need to be launched from Brooklyn.
We’re taking this opportunity to read the very clear tea leaves from Douglas Elliman and call it: Save your money. The Midwest is the new Brooklyn of your dreams.
