The Brian Lehrer Show

Bankification of New York is Concern in Upper and Middle Class Neighborhoods,

NYC's Underbanked Areas Have Few or If Any Local Banking Services

Please bring balance to your Bankification Story

According to New York State Banking Department and Superintendent of Banks Richard Neiman, there are still over 800,000 residents in New York City who live in underbanked neighborhoods.

Instead of having many banking or financial service options, these people have one choice -- high cost checking cashing parlors.

For example, residents in Queensbridge and Ravenswood Houses in Long Island City have had no access to a local bank for decades. Similar unbanked sections are found in Brooklyn and the Bronx.

Ask Mr. Fredrickson about what are current trends to assist underbanked sections of New York City.

Thank you

Bob Rinklin

Essential Public Relations

PR Representative for Amalgamated Bank

I am visiting but am a former 8 year resident -- and I have noticed the CHASEification of the city -- why the neon?? It looks like a strip club more than a bank.

The beautiful decaying building at the corner of 125th and Park Avenue has an old name that can be discerned if you squint.

It is the Corn Exchange Bank

Banks: First National City, Chase Manhattan, Chemical Bank, Manufacturer's Hanover, Irving Trust, Banker's Trust ...

It's arguable that in the city, people need to be able to walk to their bank branch. Fair enough.

But out here in the suburbs, every building that gets demolished is replaced by a new bank. Commerce Bank, in particular seems to be building branch palaces on every street corner. Banks are a major contributor to suburban sprawl, and completely unncessary, since we are driving anyway.

Wick Smith

Basking Ridge, NJ

I don't get it. What's so terrible about the convenience of a bank virtually out of my front door? The staffs are friendly, the hours are convenient and I see it as one way to socialize at those times when I'm waiting on line to reach the teller. New York changes every year, year to year, and this is one example of that.

No way brian! There's been a citibank across from the apple bank on 207th street for at least 20 years!

Banking is a low margin, high fixed-cost, commodity business.

There's no way 5 outlets selling the exact same product at the same price will survive in the long term.

When 4 of the 5 close, we will be left with 4 empty storefronts!

Brain,

Would you be so kind and mention the name of the poet you mentioned? His name slipped my mind while I was listening to you reading the poem. Thanks!

Alex

ps: Bobby, easy there buddy.

pss: if there is no time could someone please email me his name?

alexl_21@hotmail.com

Thanks again!

One of the hidden facts of this terrible invasion like a spreading cancer in our neighborhood is the ability and willingness of the banks to pay the most exhorbitant rents for their space.Landlords are tossing out qualified former commercial tenants no matter how willing these tenants want to stay because they want a bank with a long lease at these monstrous high rents. No one can compete under these condiions. As a result we are loosing the wonderful diversity of this neighborhood and replacing it with a a uniform, bland,sterile enviroment devoid of those shops and services that any real neighborhood needs.

I agree with Ken. We should be discussing how few of these banks will actually be here in less than a decade. If they can come in overnight, they can probably leave just as quickly.

Ask what kind of leases they are signing. Starbucks signed a 15-year lease (juicy for the landlord) in my building. We suddenly have wall to wall banks in our area. Sigh.

Yeah, I'm in Knoxville, TN. And bankification happens everywhere, including here. On my 15 minute drive to work I pass 3 First Tennessee banks, with whom I bank, and at least 3 other banks. - But, I bank online.

The area around NYU is swiftly becoming a giant strip mall, dominated by bank branches. Chase Bank (two branches within two blocks), Wachovia, Bank of America, "conveniently" located next to Radio Shack, Staples, Blockbuster Video, the GAP... Where are the local businesses supposed to open now? I've heard there was a time when NYU students would have taken to the streets to protest this blandification of the neighborhood, but no more. Students seem content to have an ATM so close to campus (and cheap shopping) and give it no further thought.

I live in Sunnyiside, Queens where there is a mega-pharmacy practically on every street corner, and our mom and pop pharmacies are slowly disappearing. I came across one that was recently closed that had a sign over it's chained entryway urging former customers to try the nearby Rite Aid, which I couldn't tell whether it was the action of a small pharmacist acknowledging defeat, or a greedy ploy by the larger pharmacy to scoop up his customers.

I have noticed this "bankification" throughout neighborhoods in Manhattan, but I haven't yet seen it in my neighborhood, which is presently in a relatively stunted place within the nyc real estate market due to the lingering question of it's historic landmark status.

This leads me to wonder if this "bankification" is somehow connected to the re-development of housing in areas the real estate market considers our "hotter" neighborhoods.

I heartily agree with the women who described the "bankification of White Plains." W. P. as we have known it, is not being improved for the benefit of its citizens, rather, it is being wiped out by the banking and business community that see it as another financial center, a place for cheaper rent for NYC based companies/corporations. The Mayor of White Plains has not balanced the mix. It is now completely lopsided in favor of corporations.

I've just finished a documentary on this subject and will be screening it this fall throughout the city. Please visit http://www.TwilightBecomesNight.com.

New York City is irreversibly changing. We are losing our vital neighborhood stores that create the diversity of the city and help maintain our communities. The "bankification" is just part of the problem - it's also the other chain stores that are bulldozing their way through the city. It's time we question this transition, before it is too late.

We have about 11 banks in our tiny town. They pushed out dry cleaners, clothing stores, eateries. It has made downtown dreary. My hairdresser complains because of the resulting lack of foot traffic that used to give him spontaneous clients. As someone has pointed out, I am sure it is because the banks can afford the high rents. I know at least one business that left for cheaper rents in nearby White Plains. sigh.

In my neighborhood in Flatbush, I've noticed more bank branches, too. But -- thinking back on the black days of redlining in our poor areas -- I don't think that's so bad.

The Commerce Bank on Park Circle where Coney Island Avenue starts (corner of Parkside Avenue and Prospect Park South West), was a closed gas station. We had more gas stations than you can shake a stick at. I'm sure the residents in the adjacent tenement and in the spanking new condo that had gone up next to the decrepit gas station were glad to have gotten rid of the fumes.

On Ocean Avenue, Flatbush Avenue, around Church Avenue, there are now tons of bank branches (some in new buildings, after the old bank buildings had closed down).

I think your comment of "beloved neighborhood institutions" such as coffee shops shows quite a bias. We have no coffee shops in my neighborhood.

Brian,

One interesting part of the new bank branch openings is that the new ones tend to open up next to existing ones, while neighborhoods without banks remain unbanked. Obviously this is true in core Manhattan, but in the Bronx the trend is downright disturbing.

For instance, Bedford Park has 0 bank branches. There are two branches in Fordham Bedford, the neighborhood just to the south, and five or six in Norwood, the neighborhood just to the north. Of all of these, the newest one is a WaMu that chose to open up on a strip that already had three banks.

Overall, the low income neighborhoods in New York City have low numbers of branches per household. I ran some numbers last summer and here is the number of households per bank branch for the five boroughs:

Manhattan: 1,159

Staten Island: 1,669

Queens: 1,976

Brooklyn: 3,021

The Bronx: 3,443

The national average is actually close to the Manhattan number (1,174). So maybe instead of Manhattan being overbanked, I think everywhere else (especially the bronx and brookly) is underbanked!

Listening to the broadcast, can some of the rich folks in "overbanked" neighborhoods please request the banks to move their branches to low income neighborhoods?

We have banks on every corner. And more to come. My local supermarket is vacant and a sign for rent saying it is a perfect space for a bank. A familiar pub/resturant has closed and a bank is replacing it. Every corner has a bank. Affordable rental housing has been demolished and replaced by banks. There goes the old neighborhood. Replaced by banks.

My town (Metuchen Borough) at last count had fewer than 13,000 residents. These people are served by seven different banks in Metuchen, and a wide range of banks in neighboring Edison. Metuchen, however, has NO supermarket.

I will shop at a supermarket (in nearby Edison or Woodbridge) at least once a week. The last time I went to a bank was to visit the ATM of a bank near one of the supermarkets in Edison, and that was about 2 weeks ago.

I'd love to support businesses in my town, but if they don't show up, how can I?

In the past year, three new bank branches have opened up between 96th and 103rd Streets. We even lost a Starbucks--the one at 102nd Street and Bway--to a bank, surely a first.

We don't have enough supermarkets--landlords hate them I'm sure--and have lost a Korean fruitstand and a laundry.

The stretch of Broadway between 85th and 93rd streets has lost literally dozens of small, locally owned businesses in just the past six months or so. It's truly shocking how many mom and pop stores have left - some after 40, 50 or more years (Embassy Flowers at 91st and Bway after 89 years!). While there are already banks on almost every corner there will undoubtedly be more moving in now. It's very, very sad for this neighborhood.

New York is home to so many banks, yet so few credit unions.

Though I live in Yonkers, I work in the Bronx and was a resident of NYC for the 1st 48 yrs of my life. I first noticed the proliferation of WaMu (Washington Mutual/Dime/Bowery) as back in 2003. The new bank branches sort of bunch together in Manhattan. I still fail to see banks in neighborhoods that need banks like Olinville in the Bronx or the Barrio - essentially the outer boroughs. Poor people still rely on check-cashing stores, which take out a percentage for their service. As a result, the ones who can least afford to give up a peice of their meagre wages are forced to do so.

From 55th to 50th street on 8th and 9th Avenues, there are at least 6 new local branches of banks that have opened. I'm shocked because you would think we need less local branches considering more and more people are banking online and using ATMs. Plus there are already many local branches already in Midtown - a stones throw away - which makes sense in the business district.

By the way, I believe most big banks also have ownership in the low income check cashing stores. They obviously don't market this, but they would technically have local branches in low income areas.

Regarding Casey's comment on CHASEification (great word!), I happen to love it. Have been inside the new Chases a few times too, and love the screens. I'm a Citi customer who's thinking about switching. Why shouldn't banks be more enjoyable on those occasions when I have to step inside?

(as far as looking like a strip club, I wouldn't know... except that Chase locations are highly visible in a transparent sense, and I don't think we have strip clubs like that in New York - with big windows and all)

I lived in White Plains for many years before relocating to New Rochelle. I am appalled that the Sea Star diner, a local institution and home to many community activities, was forced to yield to a Commerce Bank. There are more and more banks around here; my bank in WP is now open eight hours a day and is sometimes empty when I go in to make a deposit (not often). It's sad to see mom-and-pop operations going under and thus reducing the character of a neighborhood.

This is not just a Manhattan issue. Many areas of Queens and Brooklyn are seeing lots banks opening.

Even as a property owner who just leased a corner location to a national bank, I too worry about the sprouting of these branches. This is a complicated issue. The pressure on mom & pop businesses from internet and big box stores has never been greater. As landlords it is more and more risky to rent such tenants. In our business which is localized in one neighborhood, we like to have a mixture of businesses, but it is getting increasingly difficult. We are fair landlords who wish our tenants to prosper as well as the local neighborhood, but when the security of a national bank offers a good rent, honestly, Who would you pick? Another point - at least in our neighborhood, the clean appearance and bright lights at night are a welcome addition to the streetscape.

There was a serious misstatement in the interview. Tom Fredrickson stated banks were paying $3,000 per square foot for their space and therefore outbidding everyone else.

We are a commericail Real estate firm dealing in such properties. In the area in question, banks are on the higher end of the feeding chain. However that average price being paid for most spaces on the Upper West Side are more in the $150 - $200 per square foot range. There may be a bnak or two paying $300 per square foot per year for a premium location. however the concept of $3,000 per square foot is simply out of the realm of reality.

Paul G. W. Fetscher CCIM, CLS

President

Great American Brokerage Inc.

100 W. Park Ave. Suite 309 Long Beach, NY 11561

(516) 889-7200 Fax (516) 889-5113

GtAmerican@aol.com www.RestaurantExpert.com

Specialists in Restaurants and Retail

I hope to contact Dr Susan White who work in Citi Bank, New York. She is the Deputy Governor of the Bank.