1) This week's Hunter, Crystal, is looking for a Brooklyn condo that her parents are going to pay for, which, as she soon finds, means that there are more than a few strings attached. Her mother doesn't want her living in a ground floor apartment, and her father, inexplicably, doesn't want her living in a top floor apartment. Since most of the buildings she looks at are only three or four stories, this doesn't leave much inventory. At first enchanted by shiny new buildings, she soon becomes frustrated by their cookie-cutter-ness, and eventually settles on a one-bedroom near the Barclays Center. Both she and her mother are impressed by how quiet it is. [The Hunt/'Wanted: Hot- and Cold-Running Quiet']
2) Once (and possibly still) seen as distinctly undesirable due to its proximity to the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, the Columbia Street Waterfront District is gaining traction among buyers willing to overlook the noise problem due to rising prices and shrinking inventory in trendier parts of Brooklyn. What they get are relatively cheap apartments, with partially obstructed Manhattan skyline views, and restaurants and transportation...in the adjacent Carroll Gardens. The Columbia Street Waterfront District: it's almost everything. ['Between the Drink and the B.Q.E.']