About Bronx County, NY

Foreclosure problems are increasing on a building in Bronx that had been purchased during the bubbly days. In a large hall on the ground floor of a house (1520 Sedgwick Avenue) in West Bronx that hip-hop music had bloomed and spread across the world as an international culture. One generation afterwards once more the building is the focus of attention but for a different reason.

This hulky brick structure overlooking the River Harlem is now the battleground with tenants on one side and real estate investors on the other. Supported by politicians and housing advocates efforts are on to continue to keep the building as a state-run rent-protection programme.

The tenants have lost the battle and the building was sold off in 2008. Today more than a year later allegations of housing code violations have piled up against the owners of the building and tenants are furious with the present landlords. The housing advocates and experts opine that the problems related to this building could well start off a string of similar incidents in this locality inhabited by people coming from the low-income group.

The latest target of foreclosures is not only individual houses but whole blocks of apartment buildings inhabited by hundreds of households. It was not the tenants who took the loans but the investors who have lived far away from these one time highly leveraged units.

The banks and owners are trying to recovering their overwhelming losses from hopeful property deals in localities like South Bronx, Corona and Washington Heights and Queens, for the tenants time is running out as they grapple with the worst effects of the housing crisis – living in crumbling houses infested with rats clouded by foreclosure threats.

Since the taking over of 1520 Sedgewick Avenue by the new owners in the middle of 2008 the number of code violations have spiked from 82 to 598 – a jump of more than 600% according to HUD. Diana Levy of Urban Homesteading Assistance said, “Because it was well maintained and families decided to stay there, relationships grew and it ended up leading to one of the most important cultural contributions in decades. If that were to fall apart, it would be an indicator of what’s going to happen to communities that are stable in the outer boroughs.”

For a good number of decades 1520 Sedgewick having 102 units was a much wanted affordable place to stay in for the working class households. In 1997 Sylvia Jones had moved in. She remembered that the main lobby was so well looked after that one’s face was reflected on the floor. Everybody interacted like one large family hosting Christmas parties and Halloween get-together.

Do you see what I see? The Henry Hudson and Spuyten Duyvil Bridges. On Wednesday I wrote about taking photographs from a moving Metro-North Hudson Line train; here are a couple of shots from that trip.

I am really fascinated by various architectural structures and if you travel along the Hudson River you can't help admiring the bridge structures you pass along the way.

The Henry Hudson Bridge is so named after the explorer by the same name who ventured up the Hudson river in 1609. This Bridge was constructed in 1935 and came into operation in 1936 to connect the Bronx/ Westchester area to Manhattan. The bridge is 2,209 feet long but the main span is about 840 feet. When the bridge was first in use, about 17,000 vehicles crossed over it daily. Today this number has increased to more than 77,000. The bridge has toll booths but the MTA is presently experimenting with an all electronic system to help alleviate the traffic congestion when crossing over the Henry Hudson.

The smaller bridge is called the Spuyten Duyvil which as the story goes is a Dutch phrase for spite the devil. This bridge runs from the Hudson River to the Harlem River

Jennifer Fivelsdal- Associate Broker- Keller Williams Realty Team - 845-758-6842- jennifer@jfivehomes.com and www.jfivehomes.com

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Commercial real estate is currently under greatest stress since, 1990s. CRE prices have plunged by 35%. More declines prices expected in 2010, some CRE sector it might fall by another 30% from the present level.

Here some more information form Forbes.com

--Massive refinancing requirements. There is a large concentration of CRE debt maturities this year in the $3.5 trillion CRE debt market, which will give rise to very high refinancing requirements. This could not happen at a worse time, given that the financial sector is already under considerable stress. Over the next two years approximately $500 billion per year in CRE loans fall due. Should a significant proportion of these loans not be refinanced, there will be an unwelcome increase in CRE supply on an already glutted market.

--Cyclical factors. Typically the CRE sector reacts with an 18-24 month lag to changes in the job market. Since a major part of the increase in unemployment occurred in the early part of 2009, its effect on the CRE market will likely be felt over the next year.