New Condo Glut in Manhattan

Microposted Monday, February 01 2010

The Real Deal points out that new and almost new condo sales are not participating in the nascent recovery Manhattan is seeing. Resales made up the majority of the activity in the 4th quarter of 2009:

Only 19 percent of closed sales in the fourth quarter were in new condos, according to Elliman, down from 38 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008. By contrast, some 58 percent of closed sales in 2006 were in new developments. Meanwhile, Elliman estimated that the "shadow inventory," or not-yet-released new development units, may total more than 6,000.

The volatility of Manhattan condo prices certainly seems to support the theory that sales were in part driven by investors during the boom — at least more so than CO-OPs.

Via: Curbed's February State O' the Market Report
Related: Department of Numbers Manhattan CO-OP and Condo Prices