Brownstone Real Estate

I would never use this company while looking for a rental apartment in Brooklyn. Our agent there, Janet, blatantly lied to us about an apartment for which we applied. She and this agency are not to be trusted. Period. Look elsewhere if you want to live in the neighborhood — there are plenty of other good brokers — just not here.

I didn’t end up renting through Brownstone, but I wanted to mention John DiMartino. Working with brokers in New York sucks, basically. Checking out apartments with him was one of the few times where someone was professional, showed me good options without trying to up sell or change the terms, and went out of his way to make the appointment useful and efficient. Good on this place… no wonder they are one of the few places with a positive net rating on Unilocal

These guys seemed great. We worked with Natalie (who I think is from the Park Slope branch, but showed us places in Cobble Hill/​Boerum Hill and Carroll Gardens. She’s super friendly, and she really listened and showed us some great places. We found somewhere with another agent in the end, but would definitely recommend working with Natalie.

The experience I had in renting an apartment in Carroll Gardens could not have been better. Working with Rodrigo Retamoza was a pleasure. Considering the time and financial pressures experienced with moving, his collected personality and willingness to work with our limited schedules made the whole process a cinch.

We’re looking to buy an apartment and are looking at a couple of neighborhoods in Brooklyn. Based on the reviews on Unilocal I decide to go with Brownstone. I spoke to a realtor there (will keep him nameless) and told him what we were looking for. He said he would get back to us with a list of places. Two days later and we never heard back from him. I called back and spoke to a woman who said that the realtor was busy with a closing but would get back to us soon. Two weeks later and no one has gotten back to us. I’m not sure if I said something to offend them or they’re just so busy they don’t need our business. But suffice to say, we decided to go with another broker.

In my first post grad school apartment hunt in New York City, I left no stone unturned. Websites, newspapers, and plain old pounding the pavement. Virginia Dobles at Brownstone was recommended to me by a friend and although I didn’t end up renting through her, I wanted to. It was rare to have a broker respond to me with such kindness, especially given my limited budget. Heck, it was rare to have a broker respond to me at all. Virginia was knowledgeable, realistic, and friendly. I would definitely contact her for my next move.

We’re in the process of relocating from LA to new York. I called Cristian Dobles from Brownstone early one morning about a listing and he quickly got back to me. I told him I had a couple of hours to look at places that day and then I was jumping on a plane. He walked me around the neighborhood and showed several places. They were all great and all of them could have done the job. I have to give Cristian a lot of credit for understanding what I was looking for and coming up with some great solutions. 48 hours later we were set. The ‘broker’ role in renting a place is new for me, and I have to say that Cristian is genuine, considerate and will get the job done.

We turned to Brownstone when we needed to get out of a bad situation with a landlord. Cristian Dobles was wonderful to work with. He found us an amazing apartment in a neighborhood we didn’t think we could afford. He helped to push back the move in date so we wouldn’t have to pay double rent. He was truly a pleasure to work with and we would recommend Brownstone and Cristian to anyone in their search for the perfect apartment.

I was referred to Jamie Fedorko by someone who worked with him and found a great 1 BR on a lower budget in a nice area. My boyfriend and I had a 2 week deadline to find a place and looked at nearly 5 apartments a day on our own. We didn’t have a huge budget but I was pretty stubborn about living in a nice neighbourhood in a decent sized apartment. For a while it really looked like that wasn’t going to happen.
Enter Jamie. He drove us around and showed us a bunch of places, and was really knowledgeable about the different areas and was honest and realistic about the market and what we might expect to find. Finally, we found this amazing apartment — Jamie called us the minute it became available, and we rushed to see it. It was in an amazing location, across Prospect Park, in an elevator building, steps away from the subway, flooded with light… it was too good to be true. We pretty much went for it on the spot.
Of course there was an application process and because we had been living abroad all our financials weren’t in the most convincing shape. But this is where he REALLY came through, making sure we had an iron-​clad application and advocating for us like crazy until we got it.
I would recommend Jamie to anyone — he was responsive and kept calling to check in on me through the weekend (while he was at a wedding!!!) and I’m still calling him up to ask him questions. So the reviewer below who said Jamie didn’t return calls and isn’t interested in clients with lower budgets got it wrong, because we had an amazing experience with Jamie.

Cristian Dobles was awesome in helping us find a new apartment!
After driving 2 hours to NYC to look at apartments with another broker, our first broker cancelled on us, leaving us stranded. On a whim, we called Brownstone Real Estate at 11am to see if they could help. We spoke to Cristian, and he had a meeting at 5 showings lined up for us in under 2 hours. He showed us a wide variety of places in Park Slope and Carroll Gardens, all within our specifications including one we fell in love with.
He and his colleagues made the whole process super easy, far easier than I had expected, helped us find a nice place, and were super friendly.
I couldn’t be more pleased or thankful!

I was fortunate enough to be referred to Brownstone by an old colleague who used Jamie Fedorko to find her a wonderful place in Cobble Hill. After seeing some pretty crap places (its true, I came from San Francisco, so I was expecting a bit more for the $,) I saw a craigslist ad for a place that looked like a good fit in Carroll Gardens. The broker, Cristian Dobles, was not only prompt in responding, but super friendly. He told me before I walked in the apartment that I was going to fall in love with the place and absolutely want to live there, and he wasn’t bullshitting me. I was looking in the $ 1800 range, and this place had nearly everything on my ‘list’. Hardwood floors, lots of light (and skylights!), a roofdeck, a *true* 1 BR, working fireplaces, plenty of storage, and a washer/​dryer included. I’m moving in on Monday. On top of showing me around the neighborhood, and answering my plethora of questions (being new to NYC,) Cristian and his wife were kind enough to give me a lift to my friend’s gallery after the paperwork was signed. AND they recommended Al Di La and Frankie’s, so they win points for that, as well.
Overall, it was a seamless and easy process, finding an affordable, cute place in a fabulous neighborhood!

Irene is fabulous. I truly loved her straight forward personality and have not feel pressured at all during the process.
I loved that she knew the neighborhood so well (she’s from there) and was able to tell me some of its rich history. Since I met with her earlier in my Apartment search, I was unsure about some of my mandatory requirements so she showed me some things that didn’t fit all of my «musts» so I could get a better feel for what was available. In total we saw 3 or 4 places the first day and I just saw another one (with her colleague) that she recommended yesterday.
Brownstone is definitely one of the companies I would recommend reaching out during your search.

Jamie Fedorko rocks my world. There is no question that you should use him as your broker if you value your time and need someone who is going to take care of things soup to nuts. From the moment I contacted him, Jamie was quick to respond and always focused on bringing ideas & solutions to the table.
The apartments he showed me were spot-​on. It’s like he knew exactly what I was looking for — the character, the charm, the aesthetic, the energy of the neighborhood.
Jamie negotiated hard for me on the terms of the rent. He ran interference with a tough soon-​to-​be landlord. He had my best interests at heart.
And then came the time to move in. He continued to run interference with the landlord. He gave me advice of how to play hardball on certain things the landlord was unwilling to bend on. And, he recommended an incredible moving company. When I told them I got their name from Jamie, they gave me the VIP package, special pricing and accelerated timing. This guy is connected, and it benefited me every step of the way.
I cannot say enough wonderful things about Jamie and Brownstone Real Estate. You’d be an idiot to go with anyone else!

We worked with Jamie Fedorko, and he was everything a broker should be. He was friendly, listened to what we were looking for, kept in touch throughout the process, and didn’t waste our time. He acted as an adviser and advocate throughout the process, even helping us to negotiate down the rent a bit and get the place we were looking for in our price range. He was also persistent – after the first place we really liked didn’t pan out, he got right back to it and found us other places to look at, one of which we ended up liking even better. He was fantastically helpful, and I wish all brokers had his high standards. I will definitely refer him to my friends, and will use him again the next time we’re looking to move.

Jamie is the best!
I wish I could rate HIM as opposed to just his employers, but I guess since they hired him, they get the big fan 5 stars. He is so special when it comes to this arduous task. WOW. He listens and shows you what you’re looking for IN YOUR BUDGET– he doesn’t waste your time with a bunch of junk or showing you gems that are $ 3,000 more than you have to spend. He is fantastic.

One of the most fun afternoons on my adventure to find the perfect apartment in Brooklyn was spent with Tara Gartner from Brownstone Real Estate. She showed us great properties that met our specifications exactly. Prior to meeting up, she was honest over the phone and email about which places we asked about probably wouldn’t work for us. As compared to another broker who tried to convince us that a north facing first floor apartment would get tons of light, Tara warned us that a place she was showing would not get light and we probably shouldn’t waste our time if that was important to us. Tara was incredibly helpful, straightforward, and very attentive to our interests and needs. I would highly recommend working with her.

Jamie Fedorko found us a great place! He was lovely to work with and really worked his hard to get us into the apartment we finally found and loved, all at the rent we were looking to pay. We had a dog and a cat to place, which was no small feat, in November. I dealt with a lot of realtors during my search and I was so happy that Jamie was able to find a place for us. He listened to everything we wanted and was also hilarious and knew a lot about the neighborhood. The rest of the staff at Brownstone was great, it felt like you were dealing with people who cared about finding you a place that worked for you. They were never pushy and really knowledgeable!

The staff at Brownstone are very nice and they have great listings in the area. Frank showed me apartments and I loved his professionalism, kindness and sense of humor. I felt as if I had a Cobble Hill /​Carroll Gardens old timer who was interested in providing us with the best choice in our budget. For the broker wary, Brownstone did not waste any time at all in showing us listings. We only waited 10 minutes after the appointment before they whisked us in a car to the first apartment. Keep in mind, this was after a walk in with no prior appointment.

After looking at tons and tons of places and using multiple realtors we ended up finding our apartment through Brownstone over a year ago and we love it. We got to see the apartment before it was even listed and negotiated and signed the lease that same day with a very reasonable rent. While we didn’t fight their 12% broker fee (which is pretty standard), I know that it is negotiable. Our friends negotiated for a lower one.
Anyway, while we worked with a few people there (Frank & John) our favorite was Laura who was a newbie being trained at the time. Maybe it was because she was just starting out in real estate, but she was the only realtor that kept in constant contact with us and would call when an appropriate property was becoming available for rent. Totally loved her, would use her again if she’s still there.