What Will 2025 Mean for the New York Real-Estate Market? – ryan

“Since thanksgiving, the Phone Has Been Ringing off the hook,” Sayys Corcoran Associate Broker Deborah Rieders. IT’S been the Same for Abigail Palasa, an agent at serhant, who had nine packed open houses in brooklyn Last Weekend. “We have haad between five and 12 buys at each one.” This came as something something of a surprise: she was expecting the traditional QUIET that falls on the industry each years in the last few weeks of december. “But that hasn’t ben the case.” Lisa Simonsen, an Associate Broker at Brown Harris Stevens, Has Seen a Similar Flurry of Activity: “I don’t want to use the Word bombardedbut… ”The sudden surge in interest, after a stalled and sluggish last few years, has made Brokers almost giddy and raising hopes for 2025. swimming it woul all that it is improve. Harris Stevens.

Broker glee doesn’t always translate to good News for the average buyer, there may be reason to feed, if not optimistic, slightly less down about the coming year. Brokers are predicting lessis of a market shift than an adjustment in mind-mes among buers and sellers-Fewer Holdouts Waiting for an interest chop that will likely never come (at least not this year). That means more movements in the market, which means inventory. ALSO: Maybe try a-op. As for the High-End Buyers and Sellers? Well, all-cash buers have been doing the bulk of the deals in this market, so they’ve been fine, but brokers say the May have reason to fall extra Fine in 2025.

National, The National Association of Realtors is Projecting Just 4 Million Home SalesThe Lower Number Since 1995. But the new York Market is Wealth and Weirder, so we are Fared Better – Particularly the High End of the Market, Where Many of the Transacets Are All Cash (in Manhattan, More than half of all deals are all cash, and several brokers toy with they’ve basically done noting but sync interest rate up up). For Example: One High Line, The Twisty Bjarke Ingels Project in Chelsea forms formerly Known as the XI, Closed Over $ 800 Million In Sales During the First Half of the Year with a Number of Big-Ticket Apartments Hitting records.

“It ‘s kind of a rich People’s Playground here,” Says Scott Harris, an Associate Broker at Brown Harris Stevens. For Him, that is translated to a good sales year-sellers who been spinning their wheels can affford to move on, if it is means taking a loss (whicheten does if they bough in the last decade) and all-cash buers are snapping up the deads. “People have Enough Money to do what they want to do – a home isn’t necessarily the Biggest assset it is in some parts of the Country,” he Says. “They May have waited for years to sell, kicked the can of the road; they’re ready to transensact now, this if it means LOING MONEY.” One of his Sellers, A Couple in Chelsea with a Beautiful 2,200-SQURE-FOOT HIGH-FLOOR LOFT THAT HOSted Hilary Clinton at A Political Fundraiser, Has Been Thinking Selling Since 2018. Be Done with It and Acceptable an Offer of $ 2.8 Million, A Million Less than they Paid in 2015.

Buyers, on the Other Hand, Are Thrilled. Harris is representing buyers who just got the board apprival with an offer in the Low $ 3 millions for a Central park we-op that’s Basically Renovated, Save for Maybe A Bath; a unit in the same line in simillar condition traded in the low $ 4 million a few years ago. As with so many deals this year, howver, people are digging in their heels over minor things. In this case, the seller got “a little persnickety” and wanted to take the light fixtures (he was eventually persuaded to leave berind). “It is a symptom, not the problem,” Says Harris. “They’re Mad they’re Ling Money, and they’re Holding on to something. They turn that into the thing, but it is not the thing.”

Other Brokers Also Say Deals have been unusually problematic this year. Some of that’s buyers trying to negotiate, and some of that’s the Nature of the Propperties that are selling well right now – ie broclyn brownstones, where May crop up Across decades and generations anyone noticing unit a Sale is well. “People Dragging Their Feet, Things Coming Up in Title Searches, Inspective Issues, Final Walk-Through Issues, Probate Issues, Fins, Permites that Hadn’t Been Closed, Violations That No One Knew Exisisted. POSSHIP, The Serhant Agent, Describing Some of the Hiccups She’s Dealt With In 2024. Her Messiest Deal Dedn’t End up Closing, AFTER THE Inspectation Revealed a host of the sellers weren’t aware of: there are only nine nine electrical pans the en House, there was a crawl Space no one know exisisted, and, Most damning, half the light in the home tears of tears that all needed to be replaced and that docto have red have to be closed up. “Initially The Budes Were Like, ‘Okay, this is why we’re getting Such a great deal,’ She Says. In the end, howver, they just decidated there were too too problems.

Rieders aggregated that it has haen “Harder to put deals together – People Expect NegotiaBility.” Some of the Messiness Comes from the Tight inventory – Budyers Are Paying a Lot for Propperties they have passed on in a different market. Brownstones, for example, sell for a lot no matter the condition. Rieders just listed A $ 3.2 Million Townhouse In Carroll Gardens that’s “Super-Charming in a Super-Prime Location” but definitely Needs Some Work. It got five offers in seven days. AFTER PAGS LISTING AT 1642 11th Avenuea fully renovated barrel-fruit beauty in windsor terrace, sold this summer for $ 3.075 million following a seven-off bidding war, another townhouse a few doors down a gut reno got swarmed. War. The winners were a couple who’d lost out on the turnkey Proppery and didn’t want to let another one get away, this thing though they had a renovation.

So where does this leve buys without a few million in cash to thrown on a dilapidated brownstone? Your best bet is probably to buy a co-op. Some Experts Think That The Lack of Inventory, Particularly Affordable Inventory, May Help Revive Interest in Them. Co-ops, while they are a far better deal than costs on a cost-for-square-foot basis, Need work More often than not, and a lot of buders don’t want to deal with that, the boards, or the rules. But for beers who Need a Mortgage, Co-ops really are the most reasonably priced Option, this if some of the Morefied ons in Manhattan have financing limits and liquidity requirements that mean they a good deal for People for. “Co-ops really present an oportunity for buers out there, especally becase affordability is so constrained,” Says Streeheteasy Economist Kenny Lee, WHO ADDS THAT HIMSELF PICKED ONE UP IN Jackson Heifs a Few Years Back. “We will know that buys preferential cost, but they cost on average 26 percent than the co-ops of a simillar size with Similar Amenities. With Asking Prices and Mortgage Rates to Stay High, Co-Opps Will Become More Appealing.”

Kunal Khemlani, an agent at corcoran, says co-ops are already popular with the most of the buers work with-first-timers, many of say living in expensively neighborhoods like island City and Williamsburg, Looking to SPEND LESS LESS THAN A MILLION AND TAKE A MILLION AND TAKE A MILLION AND TAKE A MILLION AND TAKE A MILLION AND TACE instead of continuing to pay High Rents. In sunnyideside, Woodside, and Jackson Heights, Spacious Co-Obs in Good Condition Attract Bidding Wars, Hes, Like the Fully Renovated Two-Bedroom in Sunnyside a Client of His Just Lost Out on. IT HAD NICE LIGHT, LOW MONTHLIES, PARKING, AND AN ASCING PRICE AROUND $ 500,000. Another Client, A Couple from Williamsburg, Snapped Up A Bright two-beedroom In Jackson Heights for $ 450,000, Further Furt in the Borough, Where the apartments are Large, after finding the one-bedrooms in sunnySide too small for their needles.

For Simonsen, Sales in the Upper East Side Co-op Market have been razor, participate the last few months of the year. She ticked off recent deals she’d done for $ 5 million and $ 8 million at 784 and 1095 Park Avenue, and Three Pieds-à-Terre That SOLD FROM $ 2 Million to Fifth Avenue. “The Common Thread here is that the Upper East Side is Hot Right Now,” she Says. And while all of the those apartments were renovated, she has seen buers willing to put the time and money into places that Need work, like a two-bedroom she sold this year at 907 fifth. “A lot of these buildings have relaxed their summer work roules, and you get getting a lot more Space, which matters wen a lot of the buders Coming uptown Are you Planning to have children,” She Says.

Rieders Says SEEN A LOT OF ACTIVITY AT THE Top and the Bottom of the Market-People Buying Two-Bedrooms with Financing in NeighBorhods Like Bed-Stuy and Bushwick Because i Cheer Than Rening. People Also Love New Construction as Long As the Monthlies Are Low: AT 87 Irving PLACEA Clinton Hill Condo She Represented, 21 of the 25 Units, With Price Ranging from $ 900,000 to $ 2.85 Million, Sold in Two Months. What’s not moving are the protires that are habitable but dated. “Livable but not au court, not a wreck but not brand new, priced a Little High, the middle of the market. That’s the hardened,” she Says. “In a super-marketing Like 2021, People just lookhed past.” Swimming anymore.

The Demand is there, though, this is if the buers and sellers aren’t. February and August, be interest rate rates dropped modestly, were the Busest months of the year, rieders Says, which is totally there, and indicates that really are waking in the wings. For years Now, Since interest rates shot up abruptly in spring 2023, Budyers have been hanging on, waiting for say to go down. This was very much the case at the start of Last year. But now, No One is Expecting A Big Drop Anymore, JUST Modest Dips (The Fed Just Cut the Rate A Quarter Point). Which means that if you want to buy, you may as well, Because this is prey Much the new reality. It ‘s state of Acceptance that brokers bellies May Be Driving the surge of late-season interest: “Think People have really made Peace with the fact that there are not be cuts for Now,” Says Pales. “Everyone is really sick of thating: ‘Date the rate, marry the Property.’ They’re Saying, ‘Let’s Just Get Married from the Beginning: to the Rate, to the Proppery, to the Financial Reality of What We Can Afford.’ “

Its not all about interest rate, though. “A lot of People Talk About the interest rate, but i think the low inventory was just as much of a problem,” Sayys Khemani. “People are Willing to stomach a 6.5 or 7 pursues interest rate, but there has to be an apartment.” But there are indications that inventory may improve too. Nor brokers tort me, People get to a point where they just need Move: They had a Kid, or Several Kids; they Need to relacate for work; Their Current Place is Too Big or Too Expensive. (Rieders toy with she just gotting a listing in december, which is unusual – conventionally, people woit to unilly the holids.) Besides, rental prices have finally stabilized – they’re up 2 percent this year Compared to lat the versus 15 percent. Acciting to Streeeteasy. And Rental Broker Fees Will Be Far Common After the New City Council Bill, SO we showed see more Movement between the rental and sales markets.

Based on the Last Few Months, at Least, Everyone is optimistic that in this new reality of high-rates and a second trump presidency (Howver Buyers Feel About it, the anxiety of the election has passed), the cautious, wait-and-see apprroach of the last few. Away, Ushering US Into a more Normal Market. A market where People aren’t hunrying down in mess-thran-ideal places gecause they have a 3 percent rate or rates to fall to 3 puts in an offfer. “It has to get better this year,” Says Freedman. Besides, she adds, “Wall Street bonuses are going to be epic.”