NYMAG article "I Put in White Tenants"
Disgusting. But I appreciate his honesty.
‘I Put in White Tenants’: The Grim, Racist (and Likely Illegal) Methods of One Brooklyn Landlord
"We’re small, so we look into places that haven’t caught on — we just did a place on Nostrand Avenue. People are not even there yet. We put in $600,000 and everyone was laughing at us. “It’s crazy, you’re over there. A building for yuppies, white people? It’s not going to work.” The building was full of tenants — $1,300, $1,400 tenants. We paid every tenant the average of twelve, thirteen thousand dollars to leave. I actually went to meet them — lawyers are not going to help you. And we got them out of the building and now we have tenants paying $2,700, $2,800, and they’re all white. So this is what we do. My saying is — again, I’m not racist — every black person has a price. The average price for a black person here in Bed-Stuy is $30,000 dollars. Up over there in East New York, it’s $10,000 dollars. Everyone wants them to leave, not because we don’t like them, it’s just they’re messing up — they bring everything down. Not all of them."
Comments
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When I first moved to Brooklyn in 2003, I had a conversation with a guy involved in real estate who described Prospect Heights as:
"Presently the area is about 88% black and 12% everyone else. In 10 years, it will be 88% white and 12% everyone else".
His estimates have been pretty spot on.
-For the most part, "the blacks" no longer live in the row houses and the formerly-rent-stabilized tenement apartment buildings.
-The few buildings in PH that maintain the 2003 demographics tend to be the HDFC rentals and coops.
When one combines $2700 a month with factors like discrimination and preferences, the effect is quite visible and immediate. -
All the clutching of the pearls that this article is getting on FB and places like Jezebel/Gawker tickle me. This isn't news to anyone whose lived in this neighborhood for the past ten years. And yes it is exactly as blatant as Ephraim describes it. And he's one of the "honest" brokers in this. The folks that are actively trying to defraud and scam? Well they're actually worse.
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The article is certainly good click bait.
I do wish we would get one that has a little more substance.
For example, a few years ago I attended annual meeting of a coop located along Eastern Parkway.
A member of the audience asked the board "Why haven't any of the new tenants approved by the board over the last several years been black?"
The board president responded, "We have not rejected an applicant in 5 years. Every applicant that has come before us has been white."
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Returning to Ephraim, he is in a similar situation to people across the nation who are in the "We buy houses for cash" business.
Much like him, they purchase houses from people who are disportionately people of color, and fill them with people further up the food chain.
In the rest of the country, they tend to not have names like Ephraim ...more like Joe or Mike.
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When I first moved to Brooklyn in 2003, I had a conversation with a guy involved in real estate who described Prospect Heights as:
Agreed. We seem to one of the "few" (yes, there are actually quite a few black row house owners still in the area, but the number is down dramatically since we moved here in 1999) remaining black homeowners in the area. It's been a stark transformation. I remember when you'd be hard pressed to find a white person who wasn't Hispanic or a cop in the area. Now, it's the reverse it seems. The number of blacks walking down Washington or getting off at Clinton-Washington is very, very low. The last significant and visible presence of blacks in the area seems to be at P.S. 9, which has seen a huge increase in its white population, but still maintains a healthy black student body. We never thought we'd see such a transformation. It's actually pretty comical on my block; the black and Latino families essentially own the row houses on the western side of the street, while white families dominate in the condos/other housing on the other side of the block. Luckily we bought our home for what was then thought of as "high" for the area (abt $200,000 . . . It was a flipped house that was sold for $110,000 just nine months before). The house is nothing special, but we've been receiving offers (and our neighbors) for 1.5 mil to TEAR the homes down and build condos, etc. (The real value in these properties for development purposes is in the backyard space). But after a few owners made the mistake of selling for way too low, I think the remaining row house owners on my block are being very cautious.
"Presently the area is about 88% black and 12% everyone else. In 10 years, it will be 88% white and 12% everyone else".
His estimates have been pretty spot on.
-For the most part, "the blacks" no longer live in the row houses and the formerly-rent-stabilized tenement apartment buildings.
-The few buildings in PH that maintain the 2003 demographics tend to be the HDFC rentals and coops.
When one combines $2700 a month with factors like discrimination and preferences, the effect is quite visible and immediate. -
Re: "They want to know if black people are going to be living there. So sometimes we have ten apartments and everything is white, and then all of the sudden one tenant comes in with one black roommate, and they don’t like it. They see black people and get all riled up, they call me: “We’re not paying that much money to have black people live in the building.”Ha! No surprise there!I wonder whether this will help ramp up MTOPP's rhetoric.
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Re: "They want to know if black people are going to be living there. So sometimes we have ten apartments and everything is white, and then all of the sudden one tenant comes in with one black roommate, and they don’t like it. They see black people and get all riled up, they call me: “We’re not paying that much money to have black people live in the building.”
Really? Cause I kind of am surprised to read that....I dunno. Are you saying that these white kids from Ohio are moving in and making racist demands like that? Really??? Little white kids from flyover USA??? Are they borrowing the bull's balls from their farm???Ha! No surprise there! -
Not all are coming from Ohio, but there are those who do apparently may think that way. I've seen comments that were questionable (at the very least) on The Q at Parkside blog in the past (before Tim deletes them).
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@whatchuwant -
I recently overheard a young white woman talking about her new place in Crown Heights with a person I assume was one of her parents:
Woman: It's ok. It is small but my stuff fits.
(otherside of phone talks)
Woman replies: There are some black people in the building, but they are really old, so they are ok"
So, I think Ephraim knows his target audience. -
I can believe it. But, then again, it shouldn't come as a surprise as even blacks seem to do this. Time and time again, blacks who gain some wealth tend to move away from the predominately black neighborhoods they grew up in and into wealthier, predominately white neighborhoods. It's not just a "white thing." I can't really fault whites for doing what many blacks do themselves; and those who criticize whites for this while being silent when blacks do it are hypocrites.Re: "They want to know if black people are going to be living there. So sometimes we have ten apartments and everything is white, and then all of the sudden one tenant comes in with one black roommate, and they don’t like it. They see black people and get all riled up, they call me: “We’re not paying that much money to have black people live in the building.”
Ha! No surprise there!
Really? Cause I kind of am surprised to read that....I dunno. Are you saying that these white kids from Ohio are moving in and making racist demands like that? Really??? Little white kids from flyover USA??? Are they borrowing the bull's balls from their farm??? -
First off, I only delete comments from NoSlappz. And it's personal. How do I know? He continues to write three and four comments a day so that I'll read them even knowing full well that I won't post them. Twisted. Occasionally I'll get some unsubstantiate mean crap and I just don't care for it. But that's super rare. I like to let the sh%t hit the fans.
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But here's what I really wanted to say, and I just posted it:
Been thinking this over. I don't like the smell of it, and I'll come right out and say it. There's something rotten in Denmark about that article I just posted about. I'm a fairly good judge of bullshit, and I'm starting to sense either a tad bit or a big pile. I'm might be wrong, but here's what I was thinking on my bike ride over the Manhattan bridge. (Spectacular by the way, except that weird Apocalyptic wind brewing.)
I'm not saying Gibson went for the marketing jugular here. Actually, that is what I'm saying. His book just came out, and this stuff is going through the roof on social media. I'm sure Mr. Gibson will profit quite handsomely off his oral history of gentrification. Imagine that. A white guy making money off gentrification.
What bothers me is that this very big issue of real-estate-ambulance-chasing is being reduced to some offhand and (literally) under the breath comments by a single guy. If in fact everything he's saying is reported accurately (I have to assume in the age of high profile writer's fraud that NY Mag listened to the tapes...yes?) then there are THREE hard-to-fathom things happening.
1. White people are moving in and expressing their displeasure in having to live in the same building as black people. Really? Privately they might be uncomfortable, but in 2015 it's REALLY uncool to express your racism publicly. And newcomer Brooklynites are painfully cool. And saying it to your landlord or management company is pretty darn public. I'm guessing it happens...um...not a hell of a lot. The fact is, buildings are changing so fast the racists hardly have to say much of ANYthing and their dreams will come true.
2. Even if they ARE uncomfortable with the old-school neighborhood types, they're DEFINITELY not going to be uptight about roommates of color, as expressed in the article. I mean these kids mostly went to liberal arts schools and bent over backwards to be cool on race. And if you hadn't noticed, interracial dating and groups of partiers is hardly uncommon. Middle to Upper Class people don't generally have a problem hanging out with a diverse group of other Middle to Upper Class people.
3. This Ephraim fellow must be having a bad common-sense day, or why would he be sharing this stuff so openly? One reason would be if, in a warped way, he's trying to impress Gibson. If that's the case, all bets are off. He could just be lying in that way that braggarts do, or exaggerating. Hell he basically says he has to lie to do his job. Why should we take him at his word here?
No, I'm not excusing this guy's behavior, or doubting that the actual transactions themselves are happening. For the most part, it's public record. But my instincts tell me this is more about selling books than in telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
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Eh...when I read that part of the article, I felt like Ephraim was exaggerating the racism of the tenants to justify why brokers/developers have to partake in racist actions. While some people may feel uneasy about blacks moving into a building, I don't think it would warrant a complaint to the broker because one moved in. Especially if it was someone's roommate, which probably means it's a black professional or student. I get his point, which is that brokers are in the business of making money and making tenants that pay good money happy, so they have no choice but to look after the preferences of those tenants. But the example was a bit of a stretch.
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Ha, @theqatparkside, great minds think alike.
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@theqatparkside
Ephraim could have reached his conclusions based on his observations of how fast he can fill a building that is all white VS one with blacks in it, as opposed to actual quotes from white tenants.
For example, I have no trouble believing that the white woman I overheard on her cell phone would choose an all white building.
She would do this not because SHE is racist per se, but because by doing so she would not have to endure the "concern" of her parent(s) re: whether she is "safe" in her building or is "truly doing ok in NYC".
People in their 20s often have their parents visit to show off their accomplishments/adulthood, and I often see them on weekends touring the neighborhood with their out-of-town parents.
If they have a parent who has only experienced the black lower class, that parent may effectively influence their choices regardless of whether they themselves hold such views and attended an integrated, liberal university.
For example, in a parent's mind it may be one thing to have blacks in your neighborhood, but a whole 'nother thing to have them actually living in your building.
Because that parent still wields a great deal of power (be it in the form of being a guarantor and/or a mere "visitor"), the young woman I describe may not be as independent as she perceives herself to be, or as others perceive her as being.
I believe there are many new residents in her situation.
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People in their 20s often have their parents visit to show off their accomplishments/adulthood, and I often see them on weekends touring the neighborhood with their out-of-town parents.
People in their 20's who are giving a tour to their parents are showing them how well they are spending Daddy's money. -
yup.
Even if they are now "financially independent", they use the opportunity to show their parents how well they are doing.
IE How well they are spending the money/effort/work their parents put into them to make them who they are today.
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There's almost no such thing as a financially independent 20 something.
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All of which leads to my premise:
As the cities across the country receive more young white residents from areas in which their parents have had little to no exposure to the black middle class, the city will become increasingly racially and economically segregated, regardless of whether those young residents want same.
....because Ephrain, Joe and Mike have spent quality time with their parents. -
i'm a completely financially independent 20 something
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@suppleknuckles
Congrats.
Are you also free from how your parents may define success?
If they defined success as being inversely related to living in a building with black people, would you choose the all white building in order to avoid having to tell them they "need to open their mind" when they come to visit?
(you don't have to answer) -
I am a financially independent 20 something (though I'm now pushing 30). I destroy my parents dreams for me on a daily basis. They have no $ to offer me, so I am not beholden.Am I lucky?
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I am not sure.
Some of your 20-something peers make out pretty well by being born into a wealthy family and then adhering to their definition of success.
Other young people don't have this as an option.
-Their parents have no $ or emotional approval to offer whether they appease them or not.
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As a Black woman, I am chuckling.
I have a PhD. I am a single childless woman. I work a bunch of hours etc, yet when I was looking for a new place to live, I was routinely asked whether I was going to bring men into my apartment to live; how there was a limit to how many people/family and children could live there, and whether I would have loud parties.
yeah. This was only 4 years ago
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Time and time again, blacks who gain some wealth tend to move away from the predominately black neighborhoods they grew up in and into wealthier, predominately white neighborhoods. It's not just a "white thing."
Not true. Studies based on 2010 Census data show that well-off black people are more likely to live in poor minority-majority neighborhoods. "In fact, the average white household that earns less than $40,000 is in a more affluent, resource-rich neighborhood than a black or Hispanic household that earns more than $75,000." (source) Housing discrimination and mortgage lending discrimination are major factors in this segregation. -
Ephraim could have reached his conclusions based on his observations of how fast he can fill a building that is all white VS one with blacks in it, as opposed to actual quotes from white tenants.
For example, I have no trouble believing that the white woman I overheard on her cell phone would choose an all white building.
She would do this not because SHE is racist per se, but because by doing so she would not have to endure the "concern" of her parent(s) re: whether she is "safe" in her building or is "truly doing ok in NYC".Well, then, to be fair, she is racist, or rather, participating in a system structured by racism without questioning it.I don't think there's even the slightest doubt that there is a tremendous amount of structural racism in the American housing market -- I've worked on the edges of this issue, and the things people get away with are jaw-dropping. New York City is hardly immune.Blaming the parents is letting people off the hook, in my opinion -- how many of these young white people who say they aren't racist don't have more than a single friend of color, if that many? A white person who has grown up in a racially segregated environment and considered that normal is not going to be as comfortable choosing to live in a racially diverse or high-minority building. They are more likely to choose to move to a building where they feel "at home" -- not because they are actively racist, but because they grew up inside a racist society. And the quoted landlord knows he can get a lot more rent from a rich white kid than from a middle-class black family. So yeah, I believe that article -- maybe he's dramatizing some of the details, but absolutely I believe the general story is the truth.And, as a datapoint -- as a white woman, I have never been asked the sort of questions @the psycho-ologist was asked during her apartment hunt. -
Two interesting takes on this discussion:The first on ongoing housing discrimination and its impact on blacks:and the second on how whites perceive race and racism
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Tupac and Bruce chime in:
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Blaming the parents is letting people off the hook, in my opinion -- how many
of these young white people who say they aren't racist don't have more
than a single friend of color, if that many? A white person who has grown up in a racially segregated environment and considered that normal is not going to be as comfortable choosing to live in a racially diverse or high-minority building. They are more
likely to choose to move to a building where they feel "at home" -
Not sure whats happening, I it's making my comments sound crazy and wont let me edit!
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