The outdoor pool is one of the residential amenities at the Oceana condominiums, a gated community. The complex is expanding with the planned construction of a new building and more units to be offfered for sale.

Draw to Brighton Beach is by the Sea, by the Sea

THE NEW YORK TIMES
July 20, 2001
Residential Real Estate

By Rachelle Garbarine

For buyers at the Oceana condominium development, which is taking shape on 15 acres once occupied by the Brighton Beach Baths, a major attraction is the same thing that once drew bathers - the Atlantic Ocean.

That is the case for Vsevolod and Natalie Maksin, who moved in March to a two-bedroom apartment, with water views, that they bought in 1999 after looking at blueprints. "Being able to see and feel the water was one of the most important considerations," said Mr. Maksin, a lawyer and an accountant at Pricewaterhouse Coopers in Manhattan.

Five buildings with 272 two- to four-bedroom apartments, including penthouses, are now on the site of the bath complex, which closed in 1997. Ultimately, there will be 850 apartments in 15 5 to 12-story buildings in Oceana, a gated community separated from the ocean by the Boardwalk.

The development, among the largest market-rate housing projects in the boroughs outside of Manhattan in decades, has been under construction for the last 16 months. Its recreational amenities, including a health club and indoor and outdoor pools, have opened. And with all but 30 of the initial units sold, sales will begin this month for 75 more units in the sixth building, said Joshua L. Muss. He is the president of Muss Development Company, of Forest Hills, Queens, which is developing the $325 million project with the Carlyle Group of Washington.

Construction on the latest structure will start in two months and is scheduled for completion in 13 months. The building will overlook Brighton Beach Avenue, with its rows of neighborhood stores, and Manhattan beyond. Its apartments are to have two and three bedrooms with 1,000 to 1,550 square feet, and cost $325,000 to $500,000, or $300 to $350 a square foot on average. When the complex opened, the average per square foot price was $250, said Jason A. Muss, Joshua's son and a company vice president.

Despite the cooling economy, "we have raised prices because as an oceanfront project it is somewhat insulated," Jason Muss said. "We are selling a lifestyle."

Joshua Muss said the biggest issue "is having enough inventory."

That is also the case in many Brooklyn neighborhoods, said Jeffrey J. Ferretti, president of National Brokerage in Mill Basin and past president of the Brooklyn Board of Realtors. "Nothing has cooled here," he said.

Howard M. Ginsburg, a sales agent at National Brokerage, said that in the last year prices have risen by an average of 20 percent for one- and two-family homes and by 10 percent for condominiums.

"Houses are still selling," he said. "But only a scattered number of new ones are being built." Mr. Maksin said he bought his Oceana apartment, which cost in the $300,000 range, because at one-third the price of a comparable size unit in Manhattan, "it is a great value," with the potential to appreciate over time.

Monthly maintenance charges range from $211 to $968 for the apartments and higher for the penthouses. Real estate taxes at the complex will be kept low thanks to a 15-year abatement, with taxes fully abated for 11 years and rising after that by 20 percent a year.

Despite sales that have been strong enough to support price increases, Joshua Muss said his company's development style was cautious. "We will still build one building at a time," he said.

Three more structures with 50 to 70 apartments each are in various stages of approval by the New York State attorney general's office, and make up the next wave of construction at the development, he said. A one-acre public park at the entrance to the site along Brighton Beach Avenue is also planned.

The idea of reshaping the site for housing dates to 1986. From then through the early 1990's, Stephen Muss, Joshua Muss's cousin, tried unsuccessfully to develop 1,500 condominiums in four towers, rising as high as 32 stories. The project was put off in the mid-1990's because of the real-estate recession.

In 1999, Joshua Muss bought the property and reconfigured the project to its present scale and layout. The shorter buildings meet the height restrictions under the area's waterfront zoning, which also required that they not block the view of the water from Brighton Beach Avenue.

All the buildings at Oceana are designed with gabled roofs and balconies to blend with their older neighbors. The new buildings are also clad in prefabricated stucco panels to better weather the elements that come with a beachfront location. Most of the units at the complex will have full or part ocean views.