New Yorkers are movin’ on up — to northern Manhattan, that is, and the area has seen record sales numbers, according to a new real estate report.
As prices continue to rise in long sought after parts of Manhattan, buyers are more frequently hunting for more affordable options in the area, according to Jonathan Miller, president of an appraisal and consulting firm affiliated with Douglas Elliman.
Miller, whose firm produces quarterly reports on the Manhattan market, said Douglas Elliman stats released Wednesday show sales in Harlem, Washington Heights and Inwood now represent 8% of the borough’s transactions — a share that has grown fourfold over the past 20 years.
“Just to pick a three-year window, pricing has risen, and in most cases, at a double-digit pace,” Miller said of the area.
Harlem is one of a few areas that has had more of its housing change hands. The number of condo sales there grew nearly 34% over the past year, while the number of co-op sales rose 6%, according to Miller’s research.
“Harlem is seen as value,” said Diane Ramirez, chairman and CEO of Halstead. “A couple of years ago, it was just, ‘I want something priced right.’ … Right now value is everything. If a buyer does not see value, they’re not going to move forward.”
Quarterly reports from Halstead and Elliman show the Manhattan home sales market maintains a lucrative stride.
The median price grew 10% over the last year to a record high of $1.205 million, according to Halstead, which analyzed data from 2,601 home sales in the borough. The number of sales larger than $5 million jumped 41% over the past year; and the number of sales larger than $10 million increased 30%, according to Halstead.
There was a flurry of home sales activity in Manhattan this past quarter, which researchers said reflected a desire to buy ahead of anticipated, but not fully born-out, hikes in the interest rate. Halstead found 23% more purchases were made this quarter, when compared to this period last year. And Miller said he found a 15% hike in transactions over the same period.
“The expectation was this quarter, there would be an uptick, in terms of it being a spring market, which is the big time of the year, but not to this degree,” Miller said. “The consumer thought in the early part of the year that interest rates were going to jump … and that pushed people that were on the fence into the market.”
