Quote Originally Posted by bust View Post
Coming from someone who knows this subject all too well, from both cities, the big piece you're missing is that people leaving Brooklyn don't want today's Brooklyn. I can't speak for everyone but I feel comfortable saying that for a large and very important part of the demographic little of the New York that drew them there in the first place remains.

After existing for decades as a creative nexus the east village / alphabet city / lower east side reached a tipping point in the very early 90's that sent it accelerating toward gentrification and ultimately today's banality of yuppie condos, tasting menus, and pub crawls. Many of the creatives who abandoned it dispersed into Brooklyn, only for the accelerating gentrification to chase them further there. Today’s Williamsburg is a playground for the privileged staving off adulthood behind costumes of rebellion searching for dysphoria as a badge that they’re special like they’re desperate to prove. It’s a tourist destination, where on the weekend it’s as likely you’ll find a local as in Times Square. Annie Sprinkle said it best, here adapted: Today’s New York is overrun by the children of the people artists and so many other creatives moved there in the 80’s and 90’s to avoid. Let any New Yorkers who disagree remain.

Meanwhile, as I said earlier, not only artists are leaving Brooklyn. As prices skyrocket and circumstances change creatives and entrepreneurs of all sorts are finding better alternatives elsewhere. Some choose Detroit. Detroit has time and space in vast abundance, in a stimulating urban environment rich in under-appreciated talent, history, and grossly underdeveloped opportunity — among the most important qualities that attracted creatives to Brooklyn in the first place. And as any rich person knows: buy low.

It's not my goal to convince anyone this is true, nor do I have any certain insight into the future. These are just my thoughts on the situation, from someone who has thought about it a lot. It will be interesting to see what happens. I predict it will be good for Detroit.
Buy low....hmmmm....I like the sound of that. Harper Woods is pretty low or maybe Flint. I have to think lower.