The Kensington neighborhood in Philadelphia may have become the most notorious skid row in the United States. Videos abound of the tolerated drug market’s zombie-like addicts not only in English, but in Spanish and more.
My Peruvian father-in-law learned of the area before a recent visit. He wanted to see it. I hadn’t been yet, and I was curious too, so I drove him through. We saw people cooking up, shooting up and everything else you see on the YouTube videos.
Everybody knows that about Kensington. But what do only Philadelphians know?
The first I heard of this secret was from my landlord, which serves office/warehousing to small businesses. They’re opening a big new location. Where? Kensington. What???
Being a man with large, heavy testicles, I’m not hypersensitive to crime. And Kensington isn’t a necessarily dangerous area, it’s just crawling with addicts. But if there’s any kind of crime I don’t want near my inventory, it’s property crime. And addicts are walking property crimes.
I asked my landlord, why Kensington? Not only a Philly native but someone who grew up near Kensington, he informed me that Kensington is the next hot spot. Everybody’s buying up there. The skid row will get pushed out by all the money pouring in.
This conversation occurred before the election of our new “tough on crime” mayor.
I next heard about Kensington from neighbors who had lived there. These are well-heeled professionals who liked living there when they were single, and wished they could have held onto the real estate, but their children grew to the age of being able to play outside. They just couldn’t wait longer. They’re happy in our neighborhood, and they still made good money on their Kensington investment, but they wish they could have held on.
Here’s a comment from the subreddit on real-estate investing:
East Kensington!! Lots of money is going to revitalizing this area and extending Fishtown. The new mayor made it one of her top priorities to clean up “actual” Kensington which should only continue to help this area. I own property here and am very bullish on the East Kensington market. All of the commercial businesses leasing buildings in the area is a telltale sign.
To understand the future of Kensington, you have to know the history of Fishtown. Fishtown was a white, working-class neighborhood northeast of downtown. About 20 years ago, and forgive me for using this term but that’s what they were called in the 2000s, “hipsters” started moving in. Fishtown became an artsy district for young singles. And as it goes in those neighborhoods, moneyed professionals and young, well-to-do families followed. Today a family of five can’t find a house that doesn’t need work for under $500K, and most options are closer to $1 million.
Fishtown borders Kensington, so it’s in the line of continued gentrification. That gentrification is beyond debate. There are nonprofits sprouting up trying to slow development of Kensington in the name of saving affordable housing for low-income renters.
As someone from the Rust Belt, where cities are desperate to hold on to what they can, much less grow, this is a curiosity akin to NIMBYism, which I’ve also witnessed here in Philadelphia.
Kensington is also known as a favorite place for New Yorkers (see my last post on New Yorkers flooding Philadelphia). New Yorkers have seen this gentrification story play out over the years from Harlem to Bushwick to Bed Stuy. Infamous neighborhoods you’d never think stood a chance get taken over by the money. The earlier you get in, the more money you make.
To answer the question in the title, aside from containing a notorious skid row, Kensington is one of the hottest real-estate opportunities on the East Coast.