New Harlem Co-Op Opens Doors to Residents

Ellington on the Park

By Eugene Gilligan, Contributing Editor

New York–Resident move ins have begun at Ellington on the Park, a new cooperative building on Bradhurst Avenue and West 148th Street in Harlem. The Ellington features 133 homes, and also includes 3,420 square feet of ground floor retail space, a gym, a courtyard, and a 31-car underground parking garage.

The co-op is one of the last properties to be developed under the Bradhurst Urban Renewal Plan in Harlem, a multi-year development initiative spearheaded by New York City’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development. The plan’s intent was to provide Harlem residents with opportunities to develop equity, by a sustained and expansive revitalization effort on 34 sites in a 30-block area. In the immediate, three- block vicinity of Ellington on the Park, once vacant, city-owned land is now home to a mixed-income, private residential neighborhood that offers 800 new units of housing and new retail space.

Marcia Rose Yawitz, senior director and principal of real estate brokerage firm Eastern Consolidated, says the Ellington, located in Harlem’s Hamilton Heights area, is in a “quiet, pretty, stable” area that features attractive parks. Harlem’s gentrification is continuing, as brownstones continue to attract buyers who find these properties relative bargains in Manhattan, Yawitz says.

Of course, Harlem, as well as all of New York, has not been immune from the effects of the Great Recession. There has been an overbuilding of condominiums in Harlem, and many have been converted to rental properties, Yawitz says.

But while Sidney Whelan also acknowledges the recession’s effects, the on-site sales manager for three condominium properties in Harlem (the Langston, the Kalahari and P.S. 90) paints a brighter picture. Many developers have adjusted their pricing and product to these leaner times, and are finding willing buyers. In addition, many developers are seeking FHA financing for their properties, a new wrinkle in Harlem and Manhattan, thus making it easier for buyers to obtain loans, Whelan says.

Just over 80 percent of Ellington’s 133 homes are under contract. The co-op is a mixed-income development that contains 100 affordable units. Unit sizes range from 637 to 1,413 square feet, and are priced from approximately $375,000 to $775,000. Duvernay +Brooks and Pennrose Properties developed the Ellington, as well as two other buildings, in the Bradhurst Urban Renewal Area.

Warburg Marketing Group is the Ellington’s exclusive sales and marketing agent.