Luxury Condos Arrive in Chinatown 
By VIVIAN S. TOY
Published: September 17, 2006
AT one corner of Mott and Hester Streets, sidewalk bins at a Chinese grocery overflow with dried shrimp, and a bakery sells sweets filled with red bean paste, while across the street, lunch menus at the Original Vincent’s Restaurant promote the day’s linguine specials.

ONE OF THE RESIDENTS George Chung, a retired real estate investor, moved to Hester Gardens from Flushing, Queens. "I belong here in Chinatown," he said. 
But there is a new sign at this intersection, which many people now consider to be the heart of Chinatown. It reads: “Hester Gardens, Luxury Condominiums.”

In an area that has been defined for more than a century by densely packed tenements that have been home to working-class immigrants, Hester Gardens is proof that Chinatown is finally sharing in Manhattan’s housing boom, and as a consequence, the neighborhood is opening to a much broader slice of New York City.

“There is a lot of new construction in Chinatown right now, and it’s being built by Chinese and non-Chinese investors,’’ said Lisa Chin-Tostes, a vice president of Manhattan Apartments Inc., who is very familiar with Chinatown real estate. “It seems like everywhere I turn, I see a new building going up.”

At least five high-end condo buildings have opened in Chinatown in the last two years, and at least eight more are under construction or being planned. The different developments offer a wide range of amenities, and prices are often at or above $1,000 a square foot, the average for all Manhattan apartments. 

Some of the buildings have penthouse apartments selling for as much as $3 million, and they come with luxuries like whirlpool bathtubs and built-in flat-screen televisions. Other buildings cater more specifically to an upscale Chinese-American market, which prizes luxury but also places a higher premium on features like well-ventilated kitchens to accommodate Chinese cooking than on shared amenities like a fitness center or an elaborate lobby.

Either way, the new buildings are attracting buyers who previously might have never considered living in Chinatown. There are non-Chinese New Yorkers looking for an alternative to SoHo or the Lower East Side, including creative types who want to be near art galleries or young families who want to enroll their children at top public schools in Lower Manhattan. 

But there are also Chinese-Americans who in the past would have been more likely to spend their real estate dollars in trendier parts of Manhattan or in the suburbs, including professionals who work in Chinatown and are looking for pieds-à-terre.

The new construction will blur Chinatown’s boundaries, but there is little fear of Chinatown’s being completely overrun, since many of the projects are geared specifically to the Chinese market. Still, local community groups fear that the new development could lead to an erosion in affordable housing for new immigrants.

Some of the fuzziness on boundaries can be attributed to marketing campaigns.

The Web site for 123 Baxter Street, an address on the cusp of Chinatown, markets the area as “SoHo South,” even though the building sits directly across the street from Public School 130, where the student population is 88 percent Asian. The building has scheduled its grand opening next month.