The Corcoran Group's report showed a similar increase in sales. "A year and a half into the pandemic, it's safe to say that New York City has its mojo back," Corcoran's President and CEO Pamela Liebman said in a statement.
Buyers have drawn to co-operatives in recent months, a form of housing that has apparently lost its popularity in recent years. According to Corcoran, cooperatives made up 49 percent of all deals, versus 37 percent for existing condominiums. And in the hustle and bustle of the post-pandemic market, downtown appears to have benefited at the expense of uptown, according to Compass, who reported neighborhoods like Chelsea, SoHo and the East Village accounted for 31 percent of all businesses.
For Elizabeth Stribling-Kivlan, Senior Managing Director at Compass, one of the most encouraging developments of spring was the improvement in the financial district, a neighborhood that became a ghost town during the pandemic with the emptying of office buildings. Average prices there rose 33 percent in one year, the largest increase in any neighborhood, she said.
Yes, closed shops, sleepy business districts, and gun violence make Manhattan different than before, she said. But with more workers expected to return to the offices this fall and beyond, the district should soon resemble its old self.
"People feel like they want to go back there, they want to see what comes out of it," she said. "It's a new era for us."
However, prices can have a way. The price per square foot for resale homes, which is a useful indicator as it controls home size, Mr. Miller said, fell from $ 1,461, or 3.6 percent, to $ 1,408 this spring over a year ago.
"Prices are still not the same as they were a year ago," he said. The total discount buyers pay on list prices is 6.4 percent, which is better than 2020 but still higher than the decades average of 4.9 percent. "There's still a Covid rebate out there," Miller said, "but it's loosening up."
