Thursday, April 9, 2009

The NYC housing slump is now A1 New York Times serious


A few excerpts from the Page 1 article today in the Times:

In this year’s first quarter, sales of co-ops and condominiums in Manhattan plunged nearly 60 percent from the first quarter of 2008. Average co-op prices fell as much as 24 percent in the same period, according to various market reports released last week.


And...

The stress is most severe at the high end of the market. There are 350 apartments and town houses for sale in Manhattan with asking prices of more than $10 million, and inventory has been growing. It would take about six years at the current sales rate to absorb all those listings.


And...

Jonathan J. Miller, an appraiser who prepares quarterly reports on Manhattan, said the market could continue to fall through this year and next, especially if credit remained tight for most buyers. After that, he said, it could take several more years to work through the excess inventory.


And...

Mr. Miller said that during the last big real estate downtown, when studio apartments were so cheap that he considered buying one on a credit card, people thought the luxury market would never come back. “Conspicuous consumption was out of vogue in 1991,” he said. “The market was back by 1997 or 1998.”


And finally...

In the newest issue of Us Weekly, Lindsay Lohan opens up about her heartbreaking split from Samantha Ronson, the "humiliating" weekend showdown with Ronson's family, and says that friends' fears she is suicidal are unfounded.


Oh, sorry. That's not from the article.

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