Victory in Bushwick

Sharon Masa was once a tenant in one of 18 scammed buildings in Bushwick, Brooklyn that are now one cooperative housing development.

The buildings had once been filled with rent-paying tenants, but were left to foreclose by scammers who made a fortune flipping the buildings and then defaulting on their loans.

Each building had been enrolled in a well-meaning government plan intended to enable homeownership in poor areas.  With little oversight, the original program, called 203k, instead became a vehicle for con artists.

“Every year there was a different management. They would collect the money, change our rent amounts, then they would just disappear,” said Ms. Masa. The buildings continued to deteriorate—until UHAB and local groups helped the residents take over.

Masa and her fellow tenants agreed to create an executive board, and proceed with becoming cooperatively run apartments.

“UHAB was great,” said Sharon. “We had so many people we could talk to.  We could trust that someone wasn’t trying to move us out… that this was going to happen.”

When development halted because the long-overcrowded tenants wanted to convert the former one-bedroom units into bigger spaces for larger families that needed it, UHAB obliged. 

“The idea that we redeveloped to accommodate larger families shows what kind of developers we are,” said Dick Heitler, UHAB's Chief Operating Officer.  “We are developing the buildings on behalf of the future owners. And that makes what we do different.”

Masa and her neighbors moved into their newly reconstructed buildings as first-time homeowners early in 2009. “UHAB really worked with us,” said Ms. Masa. “Compared to what was here, this is immaculate.”