State of the NYC Condo Mkt- 1. Overview

It's a lot harder than you think to 'read the tea leaves'.  If you read most of the local media, the indication is that the condo market in Manhattan is off about "20% to 30%"  depending on who you read.  It's a lot more fine-grained than that and a lot more variable.

One of the reasons that some market reports have begun separating out re-sales from new development sales is that 're-sales' are mostly recent, while new development sales can be closings based contracts from 2008 or before.  The current Miller Samuel/Douglas Elliman report states that resale prices are down 20.8%.  Halstead's report does not give as clear a headline statistic as they break things down a little differently.  Both show a big sales volume drop  (45-55%).  These are closed sales only.  They do not include units still under contract when the reports were issued.

This figure coupled with broker interviews are a good starting point for interpolating a manhattan-wide 20% average price decline.  But this is a very broadly applied average. Some buildings will under/over perform, some neighborhoods are doing worse, some better, some price segments will be better or worse, and some apartment sizes are outperforming while others are getting absolutely creamed.

Some sources (mainly anecdotal) in the newspapers are quoting closer to a 30% drop based on offers and some contracts.

Conversely, i looked at one small luxury condo project which sold a couple of units in the last six months at only 10-12% below what they were selling for in early 2008.

Similarly,  it looks like there has been a 20% drop in condo prices in the 'hip' parts of Brooklyn  (old Brownstone Brooklyn plus Williamsburg)  but many market participants are pointing to 10% to 15% in some neighborhoods for smaller units.  On the other hand, it has been a lot more than average for the absolute top slice of the Brooklyn market.

Remember an average is ---- an average.