WILLIAMSBURG — Bedford Avenue has seen commercial rents soar by 477 percent in the past decade — a faster growth than any other retail corridor in Brooklyn, according to an annual real estate report.
The going rate for retail space on Bedford Avenue between North 3rd Street and North 8th Street, a stretch of the street that's now home to Whole Foods, Apple, Equinox and WeWork, now surpasses $300 per square foot, according to the report.
That's up dramatically from 2007 when retail space rented for between $35 to $54, according to CPEX Real Estate, a broker that focuses on the commercial business and which compiled the report.
That 477 percent jump makes those five blocks the most coveted and expensive in the borough, the report found.
Nearby, on the south side of Bedford Avenue between Metropolitan Avenue and South 5th Street, rents have surged up to around $149 per square foot compared with around $40 a decade earlier.
"The northern section is way more prime," said Ryan Condren, a managing director at CPEX Real Estate who helped compile the report.
"The train obviously allowed it to be what it is. The retail has only gotten stronger and stronger," he said, highlighting the L train stop on Bedford and North 7th Street.
And stronger retail begets even more growth, he said.
People will "go far out of their way to go to Apple or to that Whole Foods. All of a sudden, other retailers want to be there because they'll feed off of that," he said.
With Bedford Avenue seemingly maxed out, the report lays out six new streets that could see similar growth: Fulton and Lafayette in Fort Greene, Franklin Street in Greenpoint, Nostrand Avenue in Crown Heights, Flatbush Avenue and Church Avenue in Flatbush, Wyckoff Avenue in Bushwick and Fourth Avenue in Sunset Park.
