Cortelyou Road Site Sold, Paving Way for New Development
A 12,500-square-foot property in the heart of Ditmas Park’s Cortelyou Road commercial district sold today, paving the way for more new development on a mostly low-rise street already at the center of a rezoning fight.
The commercial real estate firm TerraCRG announced in a press release that 1020 Cortelyou Road, located between Stratford Road and Coney Island Avenue, was purchased by Sam Qureshi for $1,995,000. The release said Qureshi plans to build a 12,490-square-foot, five-story mixed-use building featuring eight residential units and ground-floor retail.
The site is currently home to a two-story residential building constructed in 1915, which previously held the Brooklyn ARTery shop. ARTery left the space in 2013 after the previous landlord received city approval to demolish the building, though the demolition was never carried out.
“This sale further underscores the potential and vibrancy of the Cortelyou Road corridor – even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic,” Peter Matheos, Partner at TerraCRG, said in a statement. “Our team remains bullish about Brooklyn’s recovery and the pipeline of new investment opportunities in the months to come.”
A fierce fight has erupted over a proposed rezoning at nearby 1620 Cortelyou Road, where owner Tony Doleh is looking to construct a nine-story mixed-use building at the site of Cortelyou Market.
Doleh, who has owned the building and the grocery since 1995, has said he plans to put a new supermarket in the ground-floor of the new building, and that developing the property would subsidize the grocery, which operates on thin profit margins. The new property would also add new 85 new housing units, some of them below market rate.
But a group of neighborhood residents has pushed back, arguing that the proposal is out of scale with the surrounding neighborhood and would be insufficiently affordable.
Other developments have popped up on Cortelyou Road lately, including a five-story mixed use building was also completed last year at 1035 Cortelyou Road, across the street from the 1020 site.
A seven story building is also under development at 1105 Cortelyou Road, kitty corner from this location, which is expected to bring 12 residential units and ground floor commercial space to the neighborhood.
