Quick now, when someone mentions Brooklyn, what comes to your mind? Nathan’s? Steeplechase? Coney Island? Peter Luger Steak House? Prospect Park? “Saturday Night Fever”?

In my case, having been born and raised in the Williamsburg section, I recall Brooklyn as a hangout for bookies, pool sharks, and some members of Murder Inc., who used to kill people for a living.

Forget about all that. Spurred both by new construction and conversions, the borough’s more than 2.4 million residents are seeing dramatic change. A lot more than a tree is now growing in Brooklyn.

Williamsburg (now the home of an influential art colony), Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Fort Greene, and Park Slope are areas hardly as familiar as such Manhattan locations as SoHo, Greenwich Village, and Fifth or Park avenues, but they all have one thing in common: Housing is humming and the renewed housing boom in Manhattan is spilling over into those areas.

“The real estate business here is red hot,” according to veteran broker Roslyn Huebener, who has been selling houses and apartments in Brooklyn for 23 years.

After a wait-and-see 2006, during which potential buyers held back to determine if the national housing slump would lead to declining Brooklyn prices, the business has rebounded strongly, with well-attended open houses, multiple offers, and prices up 10% to 15% from a year ago, Ms. Huebener, a principal of Aguayo & Huebener, said.

Spearheading this year’s double-digit price gain — an increase that Ms. Huebener expects to hold if not climb somewhat during the rest of 2007 — is increased demand in the face of declining inventory and the limited size of new construction.

At the same time, there are big savings in Brooklyn versus Manhattan. Big Apple real estate prices, depending on the location and product, are said to generally run roughly 25% to 50% higher than those in Brooklyn, according to a leading city real estate appraiser, Jonathan Miller.

Depending on location, size, and proximity to Prospect and Fort Greene parks, Ms. Huebener points to these prices ranges for apartments in Brooklyn: for a one-bedroom, high-$400,000s to high-$700,000s; for two bedrooms, high-$500,000s to mid-$900,000s, and three bedrooms, mid-$900,000s to around $1.5 million.

In contrast, the average prices for Manhattan apartments, Mr. Miller said, run $687,078 for a one bedroom; $1,521,042 for two bedrooms, and $3,592,638 for three bedrooms.

The real estate game is changing in New York City, Ms. Huebener contends. Years ago, Manhattan was the only place in the city people wanted to live. Now, Brooklyn — with its tree-lined streets, turn of the century historic homes, a flood of new boutiques, growing numbers of gourmet restaurants, and improved educational facilities — has come into its own, she argues. Brooklyn, Ms. Huebener said, is no longer a residential stepchild; it’s a place of first choice.

Indicative of Brooklyn’s growing appeal, she notes, is the increase in new construction, which involves both tearing down old facilities and turning them into condominiums, and the development of new high-rise buildings, such as those in the DUMBO area that faces Lower Manhattan.

One of Brooklyn’s most successful brokers, Anthony Franzese, also sees a very lively market. “Business is booming again, buyers are coming out of the woodwork, and prices are holding very firm,” he says.

Mr. Franzese, who plies his trade at Weichert Realtors-The Franzese Group, said that business is strong throughout the borough, from Red Hook to Coney Island. With all the new construction, and additions and renovations to existing housing, there’s a real renaissance here, he says. Pointing to such areas as Williamsburg, Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, and Greenpoint, “Brooklyn,” he observes, “is fast becoming a mini-Manhattan.”

Toll Brothers, the nation’s largest luxury homebuilder, sees Brooklyn as a good money-making opportunity to the point where it’s already looking to expand its presence there, its New York operating head, Vice President David Von Spreckelsen, told me. That’s due, he says, to the strong initial response Toll has received to two condo buildings it is constructing in Williamsburg, which represent a roughly $130 million investment.

One is a 29-story building with 180 units (from studios to three bedrooms) whose asking prices run from $300,000 to $2.4 million. About 45% of these units have already been contracted for. The other is a six-story, 40-apartment (from one to three bedrooms) building in which prices range from $600,000 to $1.4 million; the firm has contracts on 75% of them. As a result, Toll is seeking to build several more condo buildings, a total of about 450 apartments, in the Carroll Gardens area.

In a related development, one of the city’s more prominent real estate developers, who is in the early stages of developing a new $90 million Brooklyn venture (brownstones that would each be converted into about four condos) — told me that Brooklyn hasn’t become a second Manhattan yet, but to give it time: “It’s becoming an awfully good copycat.”

dandordan@aol.com