Looking for Ungentrified Areas in Queens/Brooklyn (Brighton, Jamestown: neighborhood, good schools)

[newyorky]

Mystique lives in Queens and I'm guessing it's quite common for people there not to know Brooklyn all that well and to know the Bronx barely at all. The Bronx is another world vs. Brooklyn/Queens, just geographically. I'm glad Bluedog and Riaelise got on this thread to encourage consideration of the Bronx. It might really be the best choice for someone who wants to live amid a minimum of yuppies and gentrification.

[ShirlMastic Beach]

If the the nephew works in Nassau county, there is just no way that any other boro would be more convenient than queens. Plus, other than Staten island, overall queens has less crime. Also, the threat of hipsters spreading out and gentrifying queens is nearly impossible as (1) most of the boro lacks subway access and (2) it lacks neighborhoods that hipsters would be able to gentrify because hipsters are no more wealthier (or any more middle class) than the current residents.

[Forest_Hills_Daddy]

Originally Posted by G-Dale

Also, the threat of hipsters spreading out and gentrifying queens is nearly impossible as (1) most of the boro lacks subway access and (2) it lacks neighborhoods that hipsters would be able to gentrify because hipsters are no more wealthier (or any more middle class) than the current residents.

Queens is being gentrified, but not my hipsters. Instead it is being gentrified by Asian immigrants who are becoming affluent buying property.

[Glacier Azure]

Most of the eastern half of Queens fits this category. And also some parts directly west of Flushing Meadows.

[ShirlMastic Beach]

Originally Posted by Forest_Hills_Daddy

Queens is being gentrified, but not my hipsters. Instead it is being gentrified by Asian immigrants who are becoming affluent buying property.

In that case, there were immigrant groups before Asians that were gentrifying queens. So queens has been getting gentrified by immigrants since its rural days.

[Forest_Hills_Daddy]

Originally Posted by G-Dale

In that case, there were immigrant groups before Asians that were gentrifying queens. So queens has been getting gentrified by immigrants since its rural days.

Difference with Asians is that they are paying a lot of money to snap these homes, unlike the other immigrant groups that came before them. Maybe the East European Jews come close. They are buying homes for 600K and up in places like Corona, Jamaica and Woodhaven.

[Kefir King]

Are those who see "gentrification" everywhere, merely confusing the term with rents going higher and higher.

If a landlord paints his building it is NOT gentrification, if a rent gouger hounds a stablilized tenant into leaving that is not gentrification, and if a Duane Reade or a Chase Bank opens that is NOT gentrification.

Gentry:

The Colonial American use of gentry followed the
British usage (i.e., landed gentry); before the independence of the United
States, Southern plantation owners were often the younger sons of
British landowners, who perpetuated the British system in rural Virginia and
Charleston, South Carolina, by employing tenant
farmers, indentured servants, and chattel slaves. In the Northeastern
United States, the gentry included (colonial and British) offshoot
families who established the city of Boston, Massachusetts, and Harvard and Yale
colleges.


The families of Virginia (see First Families of Virginia) formed the Virginia
gentry class as the old guard of plantation owners in United States. As General
Robert E. Lee's paternal ancestors were among the
earliest settlers in Virginia, his family was considered among the oldest of the
Virginia gentry class.

Taking gentrification to mean some secretaries moving into studio apartments and paying half their salary in rent and typing on laptops in a Starbucks takes all meaning from the word.

"Gentrification" is another of those words conflated by real estate hucksters aiming for big new prices on the same old junk. It's sister word is "luxury."

[Forest_Hills_Daddy]

Keifer King - Are you saying that gentrification follows only one analogy, that of brownstone Brooklyn? I would consider it to apply to any situation where lower wealth population is replaced by higher wealth population.

[Kefir King]

What I am saying is that someone who gets a 20% raise that he hands to a landlord does not become "gentry" nor does his building become "gentrified."

Gentry has always had meaning and it never meant "working stiff" and God, knows, even less did it mean "renter."

[bill83]

Originally Posted by Forest_Hills_Daddy

Queens is being gentrified, but not my hipsters. Instead it is being gentrified by Asian immigrants who are becoming affluent buying property.

Are you talking about Bayside? Affluent Asians are very willing to pay extra for properties near good schools.