(Bloomberg) -- Manhattan homes that sold in February sat on the market for the longest stretch since 2012, a sign that sellers aren’t dropping prices enough to reach buyers, an analysis by StreetEasy shows.
Properties were listed for a median of 117 days before going under contract, up from 90 days a year earlier, according to the study. Sellers of homes that were still available shaved a median of 4.6 percent off their asking prices. Discounts will have to get deeper if those owners want to seal a deal in a market that’s crowded with choices, said Grant Long, senior economist at StreetEasy.
StreetEasy’s index of Manhattan home values, a measure of closed purchases, dropped 4.3 percent from February 2018, an “eyebrow raising” amount for this time of year, according to Long.
Times will just get tougher for sellers: He expects inventory, which rose 12 percent from a year earlier, to reach a record this spring.
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To contact the reporter on this story: Sydney Maki in New York at smaki8@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Debarati Roy at droy5@bloomberg.net, Christine Maurus
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