Wednesday October 18, 2006 10:01 AM
By AMY WESTFELDT
Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK (AP) – It’s not often that Manhattan apartment dwellers compare their neighborhood to a small town.
But the 25,000-person community of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village is unusual: residents stay for decades, children play outside, friends gather on park benches.
Metlife Inc. announced Tuesday that the complex – one of the nation’s largest – has been sold to a developer for $5.4 billion. Now, residents worry the character of the place will be changed.
Even though rent stabilization protections remain, many fear they will eventually be pushed out of their homes by rising costs.
My husband grew up here, it's a part of his history, his parents live here still,'' said resident Joan Colten.We very much want to remain in the neighborhood.’’
Generations of families of lawyers, teachers and firefighters have lived in the 110 apartment buildings originally built for returning World War II veterans. Many have called it the last bastion of middle-class housing in Manhattan’s supercharged real estate market.
The buildings along the East River include mostly below-market, rent-stabilized apartments, a community center where women gather and play bridge, and private parkland. The distinct brick buildings can be seen from blocks away and the winding streets within can make the area feel like its own city.
MetLife, one of the nation’s largest insurers, announced the sale of the apartments to the Tishman Speyer development company in a joint venture with BlackRock Realty, the real estate arm of BlackRock Inc.
The opportunity to buy 11,000 apartments in a terrific neighborhood in this city doesn't come along very often, maybe once in a generation,'' said Robert Speyer, Tishman Speyer's senior managing director.You live for opportunities like this one.’’
The $5.4 billion price tag makes the sale one of the biggest residential real estate deals ever. The price beat a tenant-backed bid of $4.5 billion for the properties, as well as several other bids.
Speyer said the residents of rent-stabilized apartments are protected by law and will be able to keep paying the below-market prices as long as they still live there. He said there are no plans to convert any of the apartments into condominiums.
``We don’t want Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village to be a place of pied-a-terres over the long term, a luxury gated community, one which is only accessible to the richest New Yorkers,’’ said City Councilman Daniel Garodnick, a resident who was part of the proposed offer.
Source: The Guardian