Two blocks the city landmarked in 2022
Until June 28, 2022, Cambria Heights had no designated landmarks at all. On that day the Landmarks Preservation Commission created two historic districts here: the Cambria Heights–222nd Street Historic District, 46 row houses between 115th Road and 116th Avenue, and the Cambria Heights–227th Street Historic District, 50 houses between 116th Avenue and Linden Boulevard. Both were built in 1931. The commission's release describes Tudor-style houses with half timbering, diamond-pane windows, stucco with brick and stone accents, and roofs of red, blue and green slate or brightly colored terra-cotta.
The City Planning Commission's report on the 222nd Street district fills in the rest. The houses were designed by the firm of Monda & Bertolazzi for the Brooklyn-based developer Selective Homes Inc. Each row of 23 mirrors the other across the street, in six house types, five of them paired houses that share a vestibule. Driveways were placed inside the block so the front lawns could run unbroken. The full history is in the LPC designation report, LP-2655.
If the house you want is inside a district
Exterior work on a building in a historic district, such as new windows, a new roof, masonry repair or a front door, needs LPC approval before it starts. For a buyer that turns the inspection report into a budget document, because like-for-like materials cost more. Here is what the materials named in the designation mean in practice:
- Slate and terra-cotta tile roofs can last far longer than asphalt, but the flashing, the fasteners and the underlayment beneath them do not. Slipped or cracked pieces, tar smeared in the valleys and a copper valley gone thin are what we look for from the ground and from the attic side.
- Stucco and half timbering hide water damage well. Cracks at window corners, staining below the timbers and soft wood where a timber meets stucco all deserve a probe.
- Diamond-pane and steel casement windows are usually single glazed. We check for rusted frames, failed putty and sashes painted shut, and price in the fact that replacements must be approved.
- Paired houses sharing a vestibule share more than a door: the roof line, the gutter and the party wall are joint concerns, so we look at the neighbor's side of that junction as well.
The other six thousand homes
Ninety-six houses are landmarked. The Census Bureau's 2020–2024 American Community Survey counts 6,852 housing units in ZIP Code Tabulation Area 11411, and the numbers describe a neighborhood of houses, not apartments: 69.6 percent detached single-family, 14.4 percent attached single-family, 11.3 percent in two-unit buildings. Owners occupy 84.7 percent of homes (tables B25024 and B25003). About a quarter of the housing, 24.8 percent, predates 1940; two-thirds, 66.4 percent, was built from 1940 through 1969; and 94.5 percent is older than 1980.
The planning report explains the timing. The area was farmland in the old town of Jamaica, worked in part by enslaved people until New York abolished slavery in 1827, and it stayed rural into the 1920s, when the Cambria Heights name came into wide use. Building then followed the automobile: the report credits a "boom in suburban middle-class house building made possible by increasing automobile ownership." Houses built for car owners usually came with a driveway and a garage, and both belong in the inspection. A driveway pitched toward the garage door, or a detached garage whose slab has cracked and sunk, is a common way for water to reach a foundation.
Oil heat
Fuel oil heats 13.8 percent of homes in area 11411, against 79.7 percent on utility gas (table B25040). Compare Howard Beach's census area 11414, where the oil share is 3.8 percent. In a house that burns oil we examine the tank for weeping seams and rusted legs and the burner and flue for service history. In a house that used to burn oil, we look for what was left behind: an abandoned basement tank, or a fill pipe and vent on the outside wall that point to a tank buried in the yard. A buried tank should be located and documented before closing. We also check whether the chimney was lined when the new gas boiler went in, since gas exhaust is cooler and wetter than oil exhaust and is hard on old unlined brick.
Water and the street
Queens Community Board 13, whose district runs east to the Nassau County line and counts Cambria Heights among its sixteen communities, says in its profile that some of those communities "suffer from regular flooding." The profile does not name blocks. Check your address on the city's stormwater flood map; in the basement we look for a sump, mineral staining low on the walls, and finishes that seem newer than the rest of the house.
Gas piping, briefly
Most Cambria Heights homes are one- or two-family and so are exempt from Local Law 152 gas piping inspections; the few larger buildings follow Community District 13's sub-cycle B dates of 2025 and 2029. A basement apartment, here as anywhere, is legal only if the certificate of occupancy says so.
No subway; the Q4 to Jamaica
There is no subway station in Cambria Heights in the MTA's station data. The Q4 bus runs from Cambria Heights to Jamaica by way of Linden Boulevard and Merrick Boulevard.
We come out from East New York, Brooklyn. The walkthrough is in English or Bangla, whichever is easier for your family, and the home inspection report is sent the same day. Get in touch with the address to set a time.