But many liked the area and decided to stay, often by buying the properties they rented after their leases ended, causing record waves in the market.
Between July and September 2020, after officials lifted home screenings restrictions, 236 residential properties (mostly single-family homes) were sold in North Fork at an average price of $ 875,000, according to a report by valuation firm Miller Samuel for Douglas Elliman Real Estate. It was the largest number of deals since the mid-2000s.
More than a year after the pandemic began, panic no longer appears to be the main motivator for buyers and activity has cooled off. But high water marks are still being hit.
From January through March, there were 181 residential property sales at an average price of $ 1 million, according to the Elliman report. This made it the most active winter since 2006. In comparison, there were 114 sales last winter with an average price of 816,000 US dollars. In winter 2019, 110 sales were made at 741,000 US dollars.
Some of the deals that were delayed to close due to the high volume of transactions reflect an earlier market. But the current demand is still high.
On April 30, a house in Southold, built in the 1970s with vaulted ceilings and apparently in need of a little TLC, hit the market for $ 895,000 and quickly attracted 28 screenings and 12 bids, said Sheri Winter-Parker of Corcoran Group, the property's listing agent. In early May, the four bedroom and over an acre home was ready to enter into a "hundreds of thousands of questions" contract, said Ms. Winter-Parker, who added, "It was insane."
What partially differentiates the current market from the previous year is that the buying frenzy of recent months has put a considerable strain on the supply. Another escalation in inventory, the brokers say, is the fact that people who would otherwise have put their homes up for sale before the pandemic chose not to.
