Salient to Investors:
Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman Real Estate said:
- Purchases of condos and co-ops in Manhattan rose 30 percent from a year earlier to the second-biggest quarterly total in 24 years of record keeping.
- The pool of homes on the market is 22 percent lower than a year ago and the lowest in 13 years ago of record keeping.
- The time it takes to sell a property is 88 days, 54 percent down from a year earlier.
- Sellers got their asking price or more in 44 percent of deals in Q3, the largest share in 5 years.
- The absorption rate was 3.6 months, the fastest in records dating to 2000.
- The majority of sales in the quarter were of smaller studio and one-bedroom apartments.
- Luxury listings declined 2.1 percent from a year earlier, while the median price of completed deals climbed 0.8 percent to $4.1 million.
Jonathan Miller at Miller Samuel said the spike in mortgage rates tipped more buyers into the market, where supply was already tight. Miller said owners who bought during the boom are waiting until they have recovered enough equity to justify a sale, while new supply is limited as developers only recently revived projects and focus on building ultra-luxury condos. Miller said the share of one-bedroom purchases was 41 percent, the highest in 15 years.
“The competition at every level is fierce,” said Pamela Liebman, chief executive officer of brokerage Corcoran Group, which also released a report on the Manhattan market today. “There are more bidding wars, there are more cash buyers and deals are closing quicker.”
Gregory Heym at Terra Holdings said things are being bought as soon as they are put on the market and is surprised the average and median price did not increase more.
Read the full article at http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-02/manhattan-home-sales-jump-to-highest-since-2007.html
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