The Real Estate Journal wonders if it’s a mistake to try to sell your property during the holidays.
My experience is that property in Manhattan sells all 12 months of the year. The past eight years, there has been little slowdown over the holidays. Last year, the week between Christmas and the New Year was one of the busiest we have seen in my 15 years in the business.
Manhattan is an incredibly transient city with “movers” and shakers buying and selling all of the time. Certainly, family apartments move more quickly in the early spring as parents hope to make the transition for the children while they are on summer vacation. But aside from that, others are buying at all times of the year. Let’s also not forget that December tends to be the beginning of the “bonus shopping season” for Wall Streeters. That’s typically when they find out how much they will be getting in early 2007, and it can be a great time to have a nice apartment on the market.
It is also important to mention that many of my clients who have decided to buck the system by putting property on the market in August or December see less competition on the market. And while there are fewer buyers looking at these times, with fewer properties to choose from, sellers almost always attain sales prices similar to those attainable in a “busier” time of year.
