About : standard furniture jessica panel bed
Title : standard furniture jessica panel bed
standard furniture jessica panel bed
♪ [theme music] ♪ michael stoler: it's amarket that's growing day by day. people are buyingapartments, renting apartments, shopping inthe burrough of queens. so i've assembled a group ofindividuals today who are going to provide usinsight on what's happening in queens. myguests they include andrew barrocas who is the ceo ofmns, david wolkoff who is a principal at heartlandbusiness centers, michael
meyer who is the presidentof f&t development and last but not least the manwho has the money to provide many of the thingsthat are happening here, matt petrula who is thegroup vice president at m&t bank. so, david, yourfamily has been in what we would call five points inlong island city for 40 years. david wolkoff: yes. michael stoler: what has happened and why do yousee the change today in
long island city to buildthe residential complex? david wolkoff: well ithink it's just new york city in itself. it's justthe natural growth and as you mentioned when we wereoutside, as brooklyn grows and all the otherburroughs are growing, queens is naturally goingto grow, and long island city is so close tomanhattan. it's one stop away on the m & e linesand it's so easy to get to. so it's a naturalgrowth. and finally
took- well we thought 40years ago we would be building a residentialbuilding there. but it's finally here. the growthhas finally reached us and it doesn't look like it'sgoing to stop. michael stoler: now my negativeabout long island city, i'm very positive aboutthe area, is i believe the one thing that hasn'treally come up yet is the adequate retail. i thinkretail hasn't been- there's a lot of retail in queensin general for a certain
situations but we don'thave that much retail. like tf cornerstone androckaway's, they created- the providedincentives to tenants to be there. do you see theretail growing? david wolkoff: absolutely. asthe critical mass gets there, the retail is goingto follow and right away. and not only retail but wehave some of the best restaurants in new yorkcity right now and wells which is i think is amichelin star rated
restaurant is ranked upthere as the top restaurant, i think the top restaurant inall of new york city. michael stoler: now you see ifwe take the other side, we goto queens and we were talking it's the 50thanniversary of the world's fair. it's also the 50thanniversary of shea stadium being built.flushing. flushing has how many dialects? 160different dialects? michael meyer: i thinksomething along that line.
michael stoler: okay so imean look what's happening in flushing. today whatare you doing there? i mean you guys have beenone of the most active players in the flushingmarket and you're even getting into a market that you once wereinvolved with, hotels. michael meyer: correct.well flushing is- i always sayqueens is the most by census is the most diversifiedcounty in the country. and then you lookat flushing. i think
flushing is the mostdiversified ethnically in queens. so ergo flushingis probably the most diversified neighborhood,if not that or jackson heights in the entirecountry. and what changed flushing from the '60s and'50s when it was middle class and different typeof ethnic group was in the '70s when you had startedto see the immigration from the far east. firstjapanese followed by the taiwanese and koreans andthen the chinese. and so
now flushing isprincipally an asian- it's almost a stepping stonefrom asia into the u.s and into the new york market.they recognize what is the appeal for flushing forthese groups or the terminus of the number 7 line,main street station is the- michael stoler: similar to whatdavid is saying. one or two stopsto get to manhattan to long island city is enormous.it's a great opportunity. michael meyer: flushing is 34
minutes to grand centralbut it's a transit hub. i think it's something like30 some odd bus lines and- michael stoler: and thelong island railroad. michael meyer: the longisland railroad. so they recognize that inherentvalue. it was blighted in the '70s when the citywent down and then the whole phenomenon followssort of the trajectory of asia, the wholegeopolitical thing. michael stoler: so how doyou as a banker, i mean
m&t has its roots or yourco-headquarters up in buffalo. how do they- howdo you explain flushing, long island city? how doyou go to credit committee and say i want to lend onthis apartment house in long island city and i'venever seen more cranes in long island city. i meanas i said a couple weeks ago, i walked over the59th street bridge, and i'm passing right next tothe packard building, building, something over there
see all these new things. howdo you look at that? matthew petrula: it's agood question. we're very bullish on queens. for allthe reasons you point out. the excellenttransporation access, the fact that it's still a lowcost alternative or lower cost alternative tobrooklyn and to manhattan. you can get a little bitmore space. and you know our customers know themarket well and we're following good sponsorshipthat-
michael stoler: so here's thequestion. you talk about the low cost alternative. nowi have david. now i have the source as opposed to wheni would say bob knakal where he would bring outthe statistical information. andrew isgoing to give us what's the difference becauseyou're doing residential. you'll be renting fordavid later on when he starts opening up there.but you're currently doing rentals and sales. what'sthe differential to be in
queens as opposed to be inmanhattan and in brooklyn? andrew barrocas: yeah imean just listening to what matt was saying, youknow we're doing a project for somebody who has abuilding on the upper east side that can't get hishands around the fact that we're underwriting aproject in long island city at a higher price perfoot than he's getting on the upper east side. soit's not as much a cost effective as it's aquality of life. and just
going back to what davidwas saying, there is- it is still long island city. itis still under amenatized. but if you look at otherareas like williamsburg for instance, which we'vedone a lot of work in, that area is just nowgetting amenities. you know whole foods is firstcoming in. there was a long time where duanereade's weren't in the areas, cvs. so it's beenbuilt up quite a bit and i think that that'ssomething that really
builds these areas like along island city. michael stoler: but what's thedifferential today? what is the rent today in longisland city and flushing and rego park? what arethings selling for on a condominium because that'swhat people want to see. people want to live in newyork city and they're being priced that ofmanhattan. manhattan is being too expensive evenfor the upper east side. andrew barrocas: yeah imean from a condo
standpoint, long island city is$1000 plus market now. it's challenging to find anythingunder $1000 a foot there. michael stoler: whatabout astoria? andrew barrocas:astoria you're seeing condos sales in the 700's.just no product that's been built there. similarto what's happening in long island city. there'svery little condo inventory coming to themarket where you have 8,000 plus rentals. butit's an area where people
are attracted to rightnow. you have small, local mom and pop shops thatreally build up the area. michael stoler: so here'sthe question. who's renting and who's buyingin queens? andrew barrocas: you have a lotof people that might have once rented in manhattanthat are- michael stoler: is there acertain age group? andrew barrocas: it's certainlythe younger demographic for sure. they're really gettingpriced out of certain
areas that they might havewanted to be. they're certainly moreinterested in moving to long island city thanthe upper east side. michael stoler: you know it'sinteresting. a number of years ago i remember doing showsin an area which is emerging now also, jersey city. and iremember i believe i had one of the lavarack's,jamie, on the show. and they were amenatizing thebuilding by putting a daycare for the kids andcertain other situations.
do you think that's what's goingto have to be done in certain building in long island city toget the people there? david wolkoff: wellwe're doing it anyway. i mean we havethe size. we're about a million and three squarefeet, 1100 units. so we are putting in all thoseamenities. and any amenity you can really thinkof- media rooms. we have a 12,000 square foot gym,indoor swimming pool, two golf simulators, barbequeareas, outdoor seating
areas. so we're providingthat all for our tenants, creating a littlecommunity within ourselves. but that is toattract the young core group of people who weexpect to be our renters. we're also expecting emptynesters. i believe that a lot of the newer buildingswill be putting in all these amenities to attractthe renters. michael stoler: what are you- imean you have the new hotel opening with thecondos next to it with the
retail and the office. andthen you have the new major complex. what areyou planning to do? michael meyer: well theflushing commons complex which is city sponsorshipdeal that is mixed use and we're building with ourpartners, rockefeller group and aecom capital.but that will have office condominium, residentialcondominium, retail, underground parking andover an acre in park area. michael stoler: now willthe retail- will the residential
condominium be price fixedthat you- it is be open market? michael meyer: the retail? michael stoler: not the retail.the residential. michael meyer: yes, yes. no, noit's not affordable. it's going to be luxury condominium.the market area, as we talked about before, isheavily asian, predominantly chinese. thechinese want to have an ownership mentality whenit comes to real estate. so even though when thefinancing wasn't there and
we looked at residentialmaybe doing multi-housing, we couldn't do it. themarket wouldn't support it. the rentals weren'tthere. so this is going to be top of the line. we'llbe the leading- it's going to be the leading propertyand as you mentioned before, the hotel we're havingthe first hyatt hotel in queens and that's just an indication ofjust how it's booming. michael stoler: what about- andi brought this up prior to the show when i waswalking around
astoria and queens and longisland city. there are enormousnumber of hotels being built in queens and wantyour opinion as being an owner over there, youbeing involved and then i'm going to ask thebanker. i mean i understand hotels andi'm bullish on hospitality but there's a question of howmany people are running to long island city to be ata hotel. flushing because there's a lot of people who areasian who are coming out there.
michael meyer: buti agree with you. i think what you'reseeing in flushing is this proliferation of smallhotels. i mean hyatt place is a limited service hotelbut it's mixed use. it's central location. you'reseeing secondary and tertiary product coming inand i think in the next downturn- my background ishotel development. i don't think- i think they'll gethurt in the next downturn. david wolkoff: to me, thelong island city is
growing so much and it'sso easy to get to it's going to be very popular.it's already getting very popular. it's easy to getto brooklyn from long island city. it's easy toget into manhattan from long island city. andcertainly to get in and out of the airport it'sgreat. so as its popularity grows i believethat there is going to be a demand for hotel roomsas there is now for hotel rooms. if there is adownturn i can't speak to
that but i would assume thatit would hold up pretty well. michael stoler: as a banker? matthew petrula: there hasbeen quite a bit- michael stoler: anda lender who does a lot of businessin the hospitality. matthew petrula:yeah, there has been a lot of hotel construction in longisland city. brooklyn is still somewhatunderserved in hotels. so i think tosome extent it will-
michael stoler: but ithink part of what david brought up originallyearlier in the show is the convenience of long islandcity for hospitality is really worthwhile becauseit's only the one or two stops away and most of thehotels are being built literally within a certainsmall proximity. they're close to each other. youdon't see many residential things. you see morehotels being built in that cluster over there inthat- not too far from
astoria while on theresidential you see it more throughout.hunterspoint is going to court square. it's movingaround the market over there. matthew petrula:yeah i think it makes sense that it will serveas sort of for spillover of manhattan travelersthat are looking to stay in manhattan maybe at alow cost alternative or in brooklyn for the samereason. andrew barrocas: i think that'sexactly what it is. i mean we're
doing a project on 11th streetright now in long island city and there's a hotel,the z hotel and i pass by and just popped in to seehow many rooms they had on like a weekday. they hadno rooms available and i asked the question ofwho's coming here to stay and it's mostly tourists.it's a less expensive alternative. its' a couplehundred dollars. you're literally you can walkover to 59th street bridge. michael stoler:right. i mean recently it
opened up i think indecember the paper factory opened up. the paperfactory is a 100 year old building that once servedas a paper factory and some of the- they'rekeeping some of the presses around thefacility and they made it 120 rooms and part of itis even dormitories. they have bunk beds and so onin this situation. andrew barrocas: hostels you'reseeing in long island city too. there's somebodywho's doing quite a few of
them and have been verysuccessful with them. michael stoler: one of thethings that happened on flushing a couple yearsago was the oxford properties. it's nowoxford properties with the muss development overthere. how is that doing now? michael meyer:skyview park? michael stoler: skyview on thepark. michael meyer: well they'verecovered. they went through a real tough patch. onyxtook it over and they had the
misfortune of poor timingat the beginning of the marketplace. and then theyhad some construction issues. but they recentlyjust sold out. we actually assisted them in helpingthem on the sales of their third tower and i believethey're now starting to think about developing. they havethree more pads for towers. michael stoler: and what's alsointeresting is the retail i believe is doingrelatively well, right? michael meyer: i thinkthey just signed a deal,
yes, with nordstrom's. michael stoler:nordstrom's rack. michael meyer: rack, yeah. andbut that's big box and the retail in flushing, i jokewhen people visit me and say welcome to china. youwalk around and you see all the signs are in chinese andyou're seeing small, local- michael stoler: are youtelling me that bj's and bob's discount furniture doesn't havesigns in chinese over there? michael meyer: no, it doesn't.
and it's verydifferent. it's across from college point eventhough it's six or seven blocks away. it's reallynot in the center of flushing. as i mentionedbefore, that 7 train is the busiest subway stationoutside of manhattan. you have so much pedestrian.it's the third busiest- tied for thirdbusiest pedestrian area. michael stoler: here's aquestion relates to what you're doing with parkingand what's happening. do
you have a parkingrequirement over there? david wolkoff: we do. 250cars. michael stoler: is thatgoing to be below grade? david wolkoff: one floor belowgrade. one story below grade. michael stoler: now how oftentoday because many people- there are no more garagesin new york city. that's a dinosaur. they becomecondominiums. do you see people requiring when they're rentingor buying in queens and in the burroughs the car or give methe bicycle rack?
andrew barrocas:when they're buying condominiumsor rent them? michael stoler: both. andrew barrocas: condominiumsyou see it more than rentals. i'm sure that with 1100 unitsand 3000 plus tenants you'll fill that amount ofparking no problem. but there's definitely ademand and as more gets built it will continue tobe more difficult. street parking is notthe easiest thing.
michael stoler: you know youbrought up before whole foods opening up on bedford avenue inwilliamsburg. and david brought up the five starrestaurant in long island city. do you see in thesimilar manner perhaps a whole foods, a fairway orsomething else opening up in the long island city,astoria market? andrew barrocas: absolutely. david wolkoff: sure. andrew barrocas: yeah i meanyou're going to have
big box retail that willbe available in some of these larger buildings.like i said, there's 8000 units coming. there'sprobably a dozen buildings that have over 300, 400units which will have adequate space forsomething of that size. michael stoler: as a banker youworry about the 8000 units? i hear 8000 units. a lotof units. you have to absorb it. you have to rent it.how do you look at that? matthew petrula: iworry about it.
it's something we watchpretty closely. the- interestingly there'sno rental development going on in manhattanreally to speak of. so rents have held upremarkably well so far and grown in long island city.the waterfront has virtually no developablesites remaining and i think it will endure. ithink without the supply in manhattan it's bound tocontinue. michael stoler: something i'vebeen emphasizing probably for
the last year and i thinkdavid was on a panel with me last year, i've beenemphasizing the transit development orientedstreets. if trains are nearby, which is one ofthe big proximities for flushing, same thing forlong island city, it's important, how do you lookbecause when you go to certain parts of astoriaor you go to certain parts which are not near a subway,how do you look at those? matthew petrula:less favorably frankly. i mean-
michael stoler: because you havetwo major developments i believethat were just approved, powell cove one right by- matthew petrula: the waterfront? michael stoler: the waterfrontwhich are approximately 3000 units. and they're deficiency isthey're not near the train. and ferries are interesting buti'm not sure how many people- andrew barrocas:ferries are used. they're a good means oftransportation now for-
michael stoler: areyou moving from westchester to long island city? matthew petrula: for usit's always been very much about where- beinglocated close to the subway, andthat always seems to be the driver, the enduringdriver. michael stoler: so here's a bigquestion for the bank. here's an established realestate family who has been in business a long time.here's another established
company who is one of themajor leaders in flushing. prior to the show andrewand i were talking about there are- everybody wantsto become a developer. it's like in the blood. iwant to be a producer. i want to be a developer.how do you look at with land prices going up andall the situation and andrew has met the good,the bad and the indifferent, okay. how doyou make a decision of who you're going to bet thestore on?
matthew petrula: on thedevelopment side. for us it's about sponsorship is number one,right? and where we pursue development loanopportunities for people with a strong commitmentto the market, strong knowledge of the marketand with experience developing in that market.and that's the main- michael stoler: so you'resaying to me if the person said i'm three years outof school and i'm buying a site. i'm buying this 40foot site and i'm going
to build this smalldevelopment, you're going to say go to the hardmoney lender as opposed to- matthew petrula: it'sjust not a fit for us. michael stoler: how muchhigher has the construction costs gone upsince you may have initially started on theseplans? is it a 10 percent or is it a 20 percentincrease? michael meyer: i can't answerthat because, as you say, we have a 10 year horizon. wesubmitted our rfp to edc
10 years ago this month. andafter being designated in 2005 katrina and steel andchina just killed our budget but then we've beenthrough three cycles now and then you had the crashand now it's coming back strong. so we're justfinishing our gnp but there is it's heating up now.so it's starting to get tough. david wolkoff:labor is starting to increase. a couple yearsago when we were looking at it, it was really aboutthe commodity prices and
now labor is starting tocreep up. however, there's still a tremendous amountof people out of work or construction workers outof work and- michael stoler: but laboris going up and if i read correctly, i believe you also inthe approvals had to make an agreement that you have a unionlabor which is more expensive- michael meyer: wehave the same in the flushing commons in the city dale. michael stoler: okay bothof these as opposed to
some of the developers whoyou're representing who are building sticks andmortar, as one would say, with the variety ofdevelopers. i mean what's the different costs for aunion development job as opposed to a non-uniondevelopment job? michael meyer: we have our ownconstruction company. we're taiwanese americandevelopment company. we have our diversified so wehave our own construction company and that build isnot in flushing, non union.
the flushingcommons project is city sponsorship. it had to beunion. the standard line is it's like a 15 percentdifferential but in our experience it's muchgreater. andrew barrocas: usually hearabout 20 percent. michael stoler: 20 percent. sowhat do you see the next- okay one of the nice things likein bedford avenue was a site where the whole foods andthe sports club and other things, where do you seepotentially in the
astoria, long island citymarket potential retail sites? david wolkoff: inlong island city with large developments likeours you can have it within the building. but isee a lot of boutique opportunities within longisland city, little smaller hipper type ofspaces. the bigger buildings, again, willhave the cvs's and the duane reade's and whathave you. but there's a great opportunity forsmaller retailers to make
their way in long islandcity. michael stoler: now i did a showwhich people would say couldn't happen. i did ashow called manufacturing in new york city and foodproduction in new york city. and there is still foodproduction and manufacturing in brooklynand in queens. now do you see is there any- do yousee food production because people like this.i mean i did amy's bread who's in long island city,handmade bakeries over
there. do you see thathappening? michael meyer: flushing isdifferent. i mean the key about flushing is it's really adestination for the asian population in the tristatearea. so in the weekend everybody comes to shopand to eat. so all the food it's like china. soyou don't see the production. it'sdistribution and f&b michael stoler: is flushingtaking over for chinatown? michael meyer: it's largerthan china town. yes.
michael stoler:and i think also, and you see this because you rent,lease and everything in the city, i don't thinkchinatown is being no longer chinatown.chinatown and little italy are being taken over as aluxury- andrew barrocas: it's becomelower east side. it's become lolita, all very popular areasthat you're seeing high teens to $2500 condoprices. michael stoler: so here's aquestion. i talk about queens.
we've spoken about a number ofneighborhoods. i haven't spoken about twoneighborhoods. i haven't spoken about therockaway's which is queens and i haven't spoken aboutthe section of queens which is ozone park rightnear aqueduct racetrack where they're doing ratherwell. do you see development potentiallycoming to those sections? david wolkoff:unfortunately i'm myopic so i can't really speakabout those neighborhoods
but i'm sure these guyscan. michael meyer:we're just focused on flushing and china andmanhattan. andrew barrocas: wehaven't ventured into those areas yet butcertainly sure it will happen. matthew petrula:yeah we've not gotten requests in those markets.and i'm not sure has the- will the market rentthere yet justify development? michael stoler: ithink the question on
market rent andeverything is predicated on the landcost and it hasn't really taken place in therockaway because of the comment that i madebefore, transportation. and that- when it's an houraway it's the same problem that we have in coneyisland. but i think my audience and i have got apretty good idea of what's happening in queens. i'dlike to thank andrew, david, my friend michaeland matt and i'll see you
next week.