We Buy Row Houses, Multifamily Buildings & Development Sites in Bushwick

Housing Stock

Bushwick’s Row Houses, Tenements & Brewery-Era Mansions

Bushwick is one of Brooklyn’s oldest settlements, but most of what stands today dates from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when German immigrants built a booming brewing industry here. The breweries brought wealth, and wealthy brewers built the large freestanding houses along Bushwick Avenue. Workers lived in the brick row houses, frame houses and tenements that fill the side streets.

The neighborhood went through hard decades later in the twentieth century, including the arson and abandonment of the 1970s, which left vacant lots and empty buildings across the area. Many of those lots were later filled with newer housing, but Bushwick still has more vacant and underbuilt land than many Brooklyn neighborhoods closer to Manhattan.

Common property types

• Brick row houses and two-families with original detail
• Frame houses with siding on narrow lots
• Six-family tenements and four-story walk-ups
• Storefront buildings along the commercial avenues
• Newer infill buildings from the last twenty years

Zoning

Bushwick Zoning & Development Potential

Most of residential Bushwick is mapped in medium-density residential districts, with commercial overlays along the main shopping avenues and manufacturing districts along its industrial edges near Flushing Avenue and toward East Williamsburg. A community-led rezoning plan was studied in the late 2010s, but no comprehensive neighborhood-wide rezoning has been adopted, so most Bushwick lots are still governed by older zoning.

That makes City of Yes for Housing Opportunity especially relevant. Adopted in December 2024, it introduced a Universal Affordability Preference that can allow additional floor area for buildings that include permanently affordable homes, relaxed parking requirements in many areas, and added flexibility for small and mid-size infill. On a typical Bushwick block, that can change how much a lot can hold.

What we evaluate

• Zoning district, commercial overlay and allowed floor area
• Built versus permitted floor area on existing buildings
• Corner and wide-street lots with extra potential
• Adjacent lots that could be combined
• Manufacturing parcels and any environmental history

Zoning rules are technical and change over time. Please have your own attorney or zoning consultant confirm anything that affects your decision.

Regulated Buildings

Rent-Stabilized & 421-a Buildings in Bushwick

Bushwick has a large number of rent-stabilized apartments, mostly in pre-1974 buildings with six or more units. Since the 2019 rent law, owners have had very limited ways to raise regulated rents or recover the cost of major work, and many Bushwick owners are now facing roof, boiler, gas line and facade bills that the rent roll cannot cover. Selling the building as-is is often the cleanest solution.

We buy fully and partially stabilized buildings, including those with registration gaps, individual apartment improvement questions or pending cases. Our sell a rent-stabilized building page explains our approach in more detail.

Bushwick also saw a wave of new construction in the 2010s, much of it built with 421-a. That program stopped accepting new projects in 2022 and was succeeded by 485-x in 2024, but existing 421-a buildings remain bound by their affordability and registration requirements while their benefits phase out. If you own one, see our sell a 421-a building page.

Where We Buy

Bushwick Streets & Sub-Areas We Focus On

We buy everywhere in Bushwick, including:

• Morgan and Jefferson — the blocks between Flushing Avenue and Myrtle Avenue near the L at Morgan Avenue and Jefferson Street
• Maria Hernandez Park area — Knickerbocker Avenue, Irving Avenue, Starr Street and Suydam Street near the DeKalb Avenue station
• Myrtle-Wyckoff — the hub where the L and M meet at the Queens border
• Bushwick Avenue — the brewery-era mansions and larger houses running toward Irving Square Park
• The Broadway corridor — mixed-use and commercial buildings under the J and Z elevated line, from Flushing Avenue toward Eastern Parkway
• Southern Bushwick — Halsey, Wilson and the blocks near the Halsey Street and Wilson Avenue L stations

Transit is one of Bushwick’s strengths: the L runs underground along Wyckoff Avenue, the M rides above Myrtle Avenue and the J and Z run above Broadway. Buildings close to those stations tend to be in the highest demand.

Bushwick borders several neighborhoods where we also buy, including East Williamsburg to the northwest, Bedford-Stuyvesant across Broadway, Ocean Hill to the south and Cypress Hills to the southeast.

Why Owners Sell

Why Bushwick Owners Sell to a Developer

We hear the same situations from Bushwick owners again and again:

• A parent has passed away and the heirs inherited a two-family or six-family they do not want to manage
• Long-term tenants pay far below market while repair bills keep rising
• Open HPD or DOB violations, ECB fines or unpaid water and tax charges have piled up
• A partial gut renovation stalled after the contractor left or the money ran out
• Partners or relatives who co-own a building disagree about what to do
• A storefront on Knickerbocker, Myrtle or Broadway has been empty for months

A traditional sale can be difficult in these cases, because lenders, appraisers and inspectors flag exactly these issues. As a direct buyer, we can work through them and give you a clean exit. Start on our sell your property page.

Potential

What Your Bushwick Site Could Become

Bushwick lots often hold more potential than the building on them suggests. A one-story garage near the Jefferson Street station might support a multi-story apartment building. A wide corner lot on Myrtle Avenue might carry significant unused floor area. A vacant lot that has sat for years might be the missing piece in an assemblage with its neighbors. Under City of Yes, adding affordable units can unlock additional floor area that did not exist before.

• New residential buildings on vacant or underbuilt lots
• Gut renovations of row houses and six-families
• Vertical additions where floor area allows
• Mixed-use buildings with retail on the commercial avenues
• Assemblages that combine several small lots

We handle architecture, approvals, financing and construction, so you never have to. For everything we purchase, see our what we buy page.

Your Options

Selling to a Developer vs. Listing vs. Building Yourself

Bushwick owners usually weigh three paths.

Listing with a broker

A broker may get strong results on a renovated, vacant property with clean records. But listing also means commissions, months on the market, showings to strangers and the risk that a buyer’s bank backs out over violations, tenants or an older building.

Developing yourself

If you have capital and experience, you could renovate or build. That means design, zoning analysis, DOB filings, construction financing and contractor management, all of which take time and carry real risk.

Selling to Red Hook Development

Selling to us means one buyer, a written offer, no repairs, no showings and a closing date you choose. It is the simplest path for owners who value certainty and privacy. A tax advisor can help you compare after-tax results.

How It Works

How Selling Your Bushwick Property Works

Our process has four steps:

• Reach out. Send the address and any details you have. We respond within one business day.
• Review. We study zoning, tax, violation and rent records, then visit if needed with minimal disruption to tenants.
• Written offer. You receive a clear, written offer, typically all-cash and as-is.
• Close on your timeline. Your attorney and ours handle the paperwork, and we can typically close on your timeline.

You are never obligated to accept. If our offer is not right for you, you still leave with a clear picture of what your property is worth to a developer.

Market Context

Bushwick: From Brewery Town to Creative Hub

Bushwick has reinvented itself more than once. The brewing district gave way to decades of disinvestment, and then, starting in the 2000s, artists and young renters moving east along the L brought new life to its warehouses and side streets. Today Bushwick is known for murals, music venues and restaurants, while its long-time Latino community still anchors Knickerbocker Avenue and the blocks around it.

Through all of that, many Bushwick buildings stayed with the families who bought them long ago. Those owners now have valuable land and aging buildings, often with tenants and regulatory obligations attached. We buy exactly those properties. Tell us about yours and we will tell you honestly what we see.

Micro-Neighborhoods

East Bushwick

Bushwick reads differently once you cross toward Wilson and Knickerbocker Avenues and the cemeteries. Here is how we look at the eastern side of the neighborhood.

East Bushwick

East Bushwick is the label most people use for the eastern half of the neighborhood: the blocks running from roughly Bushwick Avenue east across Central, Wilson, Knickerbocker and Irving Avenues toward Wyckoff Avenue and the Ridgewood, Queens line, with Broadway and the elevated J and Z along the southwest edge and the Cemetery of the Evergreens closing off the southeast. The L train threads through it at stops like Halsey Street, Wilson Avenue and Bushwick Avenue–Aberdeen Street, and Irving Square Park, between Wilson and Knickerbocker Avenues at Halsey and Weirfield Streets, is the local green anchor.

The housing stock is classic Bushwick: three- and four-story brick and frame walk-ups, many with storefronts on Knickerbocker and Wilson, plus rows of two- and three-family houses on side streets like Weirfield, Cornelia, Jefferson and Linden. A block of Linden Street became Bushwick’s first historic district in 2023, a sign of how much original fabric survives here. A lot of these buildings are rent-stabilized six- to twelve-unit walk-ups that have been held by the same families for decades. Since the 2019 rent law changes, owners have far fewer ways to recover renovation costs, so we hear often from sellers with deferred maintenance, open violations, or an estate to settle. We buy these buildings as-is and all-cash, tenants in place. If that is your situation, start with our guide to selling a rent-stabilized building, or see everything we buy. Owners with frame houses on deeper lots should know some sites carry development potential, but any zoning analysis should be confirmed with a zoning professional.