Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Real Estate Meets Facebook with Hasidic Based Social Networking
A lot of people are moving into the buildings arising from the soaring pace of residential construction throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn. But most of them will know nothing about their neighbors as they move into the giant high rises that have been criticized as “vertical suburbs.” It was here that Matthew Goldstein realized there was a role that needed to be filled.
At 866 Eastern Parkway, a mixed use building with 57 condo units in a Hasidic enclave of Crown Heights, Brooklyn, 35 residents have created profiles and use the network. They have publicly used the site to try and organize halloween parties, set up an art class, discuss concerns about where dog owners bring their pets to do their deeds, and engage in light flirting. (It also seems that quite a few residents have an addiction to the Nintendo Wii game console.) The building’s management uses the site to post news about the building.
Goldstein, a former television ad salesman, came up with the idea eleven months ago, and it has been growing ever since. “What was once a weekend idea for three months has turned into a bona fide business,” he says.
In two weeks, LifeAt will service 335 buildings nationwide, with 139 of them added within the past month. In New York, where 70 percent of the business’s buildings are located, 60 percent of them are owned and 40 percent are rentals. The smallest building LifeAt services is 42 units, and the largest, Stuyvesant Town in Manhattan, has 12,000 units. (Goldstein’s own building is considered too small, with only 16 units.) And in two months, residents will be able to interact with people from other buildings.
http://www.gothamgazette.com/blogs/wonkster/2007/11/20/real-estate-meets-facebook-with-geography-based-social-networking/
A lot of people are moving into the buildings arising from the soaring pace of residential construction throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn. But most of them will know nothing about their neighbors as they move into the giant high rises that have been criticized as “vertical suburbs.” It was here that Matthew Goldstein realized there was a role that needed to be filled.
At 866 Eastern Parkway, a mixed use building with 57 condo units in a Hasidic enclave of Crown Heights, Brooklyn, 35 residents have created profiles and use the network. They have publicly used the site to try and organize halloween parties, set up an art class, discuss concerns about where dog owners bring their pets to do their deeds, and engage in light flirting. (It also seems that quite a few residents have an addiction to the Nintendo Wii game console.) The building’s management uses the site to post news about the building.
Goldstein, a former television ad salesman, came up with the idea eleven months ago, and it has been growing ever since. “What was once a weekend idea for three months has turned into a bona fide business,” he says.
In two weeks, LifeAt will service 335 buildings nationwide, with 139 of them added within the past month. In New York, where 70 percent of the business’s buildings are located, 60 percent of them are owned and 40 percent are rentals. The smallest building LifeAt services is 42 units, and the largest, Stuyvesant Town in Manhattan, has 12,000 units. (Goldstein’s own building is considered too small, with only 16 units.) And in two months, residents will be able to interact with people from other buildings.
http://www.gothamgazette.com/blogs/wonkster/2007/11/20/real-estate-meets-facebook-with-geography-based-social-networking/
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