The Big Apple’s residential building boom is reaching historic proportions, with developers last year planning five times more private housing units citywide than a decade ago.
The city issued building permits for 31,599 new residential units – up 25 percent from 2004, 87 percent from 2001 and 515 percent from the paltry 5,135 units constructed in 1995, a Post analysis of census data found.
The neighborhoods seeing the greatest growth in New York’s biggest real-estate boom since the 1960s are Manhattan’s Chelsea-Clinton area, Greenpoint and Williamsburg in Brooklyn, and the Rockaways in Queens.
“I think people are amazed at how the city bounced back after 9/11,” said Steven Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, who attributed the housing boom to low interest rates and city streets becoming cleaner and safer.
And there’s no end in sight.
The New York Building Congress, a trade organization, estimates that another 30,000 new housing units will be built in the city each year from 2006 through 2008. Census data examined for the first three months of this year supports the group’s claim.
“There’s unprecedented confidence in our city’s future,” Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff said. “People see it’s safer, the educational system is improving, there’s a record number of jobs being filled, and it encourages investment.”
City officials said a driving factor is that at least 30,000 new housing units are expected to be built through rezoning plans approved last year aimed at generating more residential growth in West Chelsea and Hudson Yards in Manhattan, Downtown Brooklyn and Greenpoint.
About two-thirds of new housing built citywide in 2005 was crammed into large developments totaling five or more units.
Some community groups in neighborhoods like Bensonhurst and Sheepshead Bay in Brooklyn complain they are under siege by predatory developers who buy one- and two-family homes and replace them with luxury high-rise buildings.
But Doctoroff said the city is addressing this fear “at a furious pace,” adding it already “downzoned” more than 40 areas in the past four years where residential growth was deemed “inappropriate.”
Brooklyn led all boroughs last year in residential development. There were permits filed for 9,028 new housing units in Brooklyn. Manhattan was second with 8,493 units followed by Queens (7,269), The Bronx (4,937) and Staten Island (1,872).
Richard Anderson, president of the building congress, estimated that citywide, construction spending would reach $21 billion this year and $22 billion in 2007 – up from last year’s record-breaking $19 million.
At least $5 billion of the anticipated construction spending for 2006 is residential, which Anderson said is seven times higher than 1994.
Spinola said someone could buy a house just about anywhere in New York City and expect increased real-estate values.
Jonathan Gaska, district manager of Queens Community Board 14, agreed, saying people are now discovering the Rockaways “because there’s nowhere else to build in Queens, and Manhattan’s too expensive.”
“In the past five years here, we’ve had hundreds of two- and three-family homes go up,” said Gaska, adding that at least 3,000 new oceanfront housing units are slated for long-neglected parts along the peninsula through urban renewal projects.
(p. 7 in metro and sports extra)
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Going up
Residential building permits issued in 2005
Borough — total units — one family — two family — 3 or 4 family — 5+ family
Brooklyn 9,028 105 926 2,268 5,729
Manhattan 8,493 3 2 24 8,464
Queens 7,269 334 1,818 1,595 3,522
Bronx 4,937 29 494 1,376 3,038
Staten Island 1,872 829 898 39 106
Total 31,599 1,300 4,138 5,302 20,859
Source: U.S. Census Bureau