[Inventory Collapse] 1Q 2013 Manhattan Sales Report

Posted by Jonathan Miller - Tuesday, April 2, 2013, 8:00 AM

We published our report on Manhattan market sales for 1Q 2013 today.   I’ve been writing this series for Douglas Elliman since 1994.

My Take

-Inventory remained near historic lows, seeing the largest year-over-year decline in the 12+ years we’ve tracked it.
-Sales increased despite drop in inventory – low mortgage rates and pent-up demand as key drivers.
-All price indicators increased from year ago levels – largely due to inventory near historic lows.
-Largest price increases since credit crunch began with exception of 2010's federal homeowner tax credit era.
-Days on market and listing discounts dropped as inventory declined.
-Luxury market had slower rate of decline in inventory (about half) than the overall market.

Here’s an excerpt from the report:

…The first quarter Manhattan housing market was defined by the acute shortage of inventory. As with many US housing markets, inventory in Manhattan has been falling for several years; this quarter, listing inventory posted its steepest year-over-year drop in the 12 years we’ve been recording it, declining 34.4% from the prior year quarter to 4,960. This was the ninth consecutive month and the 14th of the last 15 months that has shown a year-over-year decline in inventory. Despite the drop, number of sales increased 6.3% to 2,457 as consumers fought tight credit conditions to take advantage of low mortgage rates, and more still were incentivized by the rise in rental prices over the past two years…

The charts and data tables are updated to include the first quarter of 2013.

Here is some of the press coverage for the report today.

The Elliman Report: 1Q 2013 Manhattan Sales [Miller Samuel]
The Elliman Report: 1Q 2013 Manhattan Sales [Douglas Elliman]

View the original article here