Jonathan Miller’s absorption and days on market chart is impressive and important. He’s a master at providing untainted, honest numbers that give accurate information about “current” market conditions. An incredibly useful tool for the entire real estate community, including sellers and buyers.
Meanwhile, Crain’s has an article by Julie Satow called “Manhattan Residential Sales Keep Climbing.” It says this:
In the first quarter of the year, the median sale price for a Manhattan apartment jumped 13% to $749,000 over last year; condominiums surged 22% to $838,000 and even co-ops, which traditionally fail to register as much growth as their condo cousins, had a median sales price of $665,000, or 5% higher than a year ago.
It’s a little misleading. As Jonathan Miller points out in his chart (and I completely agree) the “current” market is flat. I would go further to say in some markets across the city, it is even flat to down but sellers are still seeing record numbers being paid for their homes, just not quite as high as last year.
The first quarter of this year was quite busy and atypical of years past, the spring market was more quiet. It appears that the summer market is heating up just a bit. I believe Jonathan Miller is correct in saying that we really won’t be able to make real sense of numbers until at least the 3rd quarter of this year.
