Mar. 31, 2009 - Manhattan loft inventory as of March 29 = 1,004

Breaking a thousand: Number of Manhattan lofts offered for sale as of Sunday night continues to reflect a bulging inventory: 
 

This is up 31 in a week, while up 324 since my recorded low in mid-August, the fifth in a new streak of weeks in a row with record inventory in my limited data set (since June).

See my May 19 post for what I am counting, and why it is difficult.

Mar. 30, 2009 - new Manhattan loft listings + closed sales in last 7 days

This is the seventy-fourth Manhattan Loft Guy report on the number, price distribution and neighborhood distribution for Manhattan lofts reported as new to the market or as closed sales in the last 7 days.

The stats as of Sunday night:

• there were 39 Manhattan lofts reported as new to the market in the last 7 days and 7 as sold (see where this is going? ... after previous weeks of 7, 12, 7, 9, 7, 3, 7, 14 and zip)
• 30 of the 39 new ones are offered between $1mm and $3mm, while 3 of the 7 sales were offered between $1mm and $2mm 
• 19 of the 39 new loft listings are in new development (in a single multi-address Tribeca conversion), while 1 of the 7 closed sales was in new development
  
  

  By price	New = 39	Sold = 7
  $500k to $999k	6	1
  $1mm to $1.99mm	18	3
  $2mm to $2.99mm	12	1
  $3mm to $3.99mm	1	1
  $4mm to $4.99mm	1	1
  $5mm+	1

  
   

  By neighborhood	New = 39	Sold = 7
  Battery Park City
  Chelsea	2	1
  Clinton
  East Village
  Financial District
  Flatiron	3	1
  Gramercy	3
  Greenwich Village	5
  Kips Bay
  Little Italy
  Lower East Side
  Morningside Heights
  Murray Hill
  Midtown East
  Midtown West
  Noho	1
  SoHo	1	3
  Sutton Place
  Tribeca	23	1
  Turtle Bay
  Upper East Side
  Upper West Side		1
  West Village	1

• 
  
   
• New loft listings in new developments

• 79 Worth Street (Tribeca Lofts)	6
  73 Worth Street (Tribeca Lofts)	2
  78 Leonard Street (Tribeca Lofts)	6
  80 Leonard Street (Tribeca Lofts)	5

   
• 
  
   
• Sold lofts in new developments 

  
  

  243 West 60 Street (Adagio)

  1

  
  For information about how I get this stuff and why I slice it as I do, see methodology for New + Sold in The Last Seven Days. For my rant about how soft this data may be, see loft or not? caution: active ranting ahead.

© Sandy Mattingly 2009

Mar. 27, 2009 - more on agents behaving badly (or is that moron agents behaving as expected?)

paging Claude Rains
I just updated my ever-so-popular February 23 post, What's Wrong With These People? agents who speak out of their ... to reflect that the Manhattan loft in question has not sold (or entered into contract), but that the price has been cut 8%. It still has a ways to go, methinks.

Everyone who is surprised should immediately pay full ask for the loft of their choice. Cash, if at all possible.

© Sandy Mattingly 2009

Mar. 27, 2009 - more angst at $1,000/ft / feels like 2005 in Tribeca as contract (finally) signed

plop plop, fizz fizz
I am going to mention this Manhattan loft contract signing while my eyes are still bulging; I will update with a clearing price when (if??) it closes and the price is available. My eyes widened -- but did not bulge  -- when I saw that this awfully large loft in an awfully classic Tribeca condominium conversion from late in the last century (the cast iron went up late in the century before that) went into contract off an asking price of essentially $1,000/ft after an awfully long time on the market. What caused my eyes to bulge was the detail of the listing history: offered first at nearly $1,500/ft, it languished for 8 months; then it had 6 other (lower ;-) prices in the 5 months it took to get into contract, among them two different 10% drops (yes, it takes a few big steps to go from $1,500/ft to asking $1,000/ft).

oh what a relief it is
This loft was professionally marketed, though unsuccessfully for such a long time. It took two firms and two very accomplished agents. The quarterly market reports for the market in which this loft came to market had nothing but good news for a seller: continued record pricing, continued strong buyer activity. Tick, tick, tick ....

For reasons obviously unknown to me, the seller was slow in adapting, and did not drop the price even once until weeks after the fall of the house of Lehman. At that point, not even a 10% drop would help, as the seller -- once adaptive -- struggled mightily to find The Market (witness the 6 drops).

is that 2005 I see in the mirror?
Retrospect is, as they say, priceless. A big price drop early might have been enough to catch some of that 2007-like market. Instead, the asking price that finally generated a contract in 2009 is within 7% of the price this seller paid four years ago -- and the clearing price (when we see it) could well be lower than that 2005 price. Even in Tribeca. Even in a (nice) condo.

Note that this is not one of those 'typical Tribeca coops' that I wrote about in my March 10 post, the end of a $1,000/ft baseline for Tribeca coop lofts? This loft is not only a condo, it is in a conversion that is less than 15 years old, and its Long-and-Narrow footprint has a relatively wide 'Narrow' (25 feet) and some windows on both Long sides (affording a layout with real bedrooms in the middle of the unit). While the original price was certainly aggressive (at plus $2mm over the 2005 purchase price), there were condo lofts not very far from this one that were closing around $1,500/ft back then.

I don't think that Alka Seltzer would have been a strong enough tonic for this owner, slow as s/he was in adapting to The Market.

 

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 26, 2009 - flipping on your head (ouch) in Chelsea / from 2002 to 2007, returning to 2009 ... then 2006 or earlier??

off 10-15%, at least
It feels as though it has been a while since I posted in the too pushy ...? thread but here's one that reminds me that the thread always had that "?" in it. There's a Manhattan loft newly (returned) to market in Greater Chelsea that is priced way below where it was offered last year, and more than 10% below where it last traded for, in 2007. I would think they would get some interest at this pricing level, but (The Shadow being off the radio for decades by now) only The Market knows ....

gain to froth to pain: The Market timeline
(I am going to set this out in words first, as I am a word [and wordy] guy, but I realize this is hard enough to follow that I will put in a table at the end, using proportions though not actual prices in order to shield this loft form being identified. As always, I beg your indulgence to bear with me.)

The building was first marketed in 2002, a full year before it was completed and sales occurred. This unit's history in the developer marketing days is interesting: it had an accepted offer very early that fell through, then was re-priced 35% higher for a short time (the developer thought they had left a lot of money on the table in the first pricing), then was re-priced lower by 10% (second thoughts on how much was left on the table), then actually cleared in 2003 at about 5% off the last asking price after being on the market at that lower price for 5 months or so. That was a dynamic market, no?

The original buyer decided to move on and cash out about 3 years later. In what was by then a somewhat frothy market, the original-buyer-turned-2007 seller asked nearly 50% more than the original price. (Those were heady days, no?) It took all of 4 weeks to make a deal at 97% of that asking price, resulting in a gross gain of $400k on a loft that is not much more than 1,200 sq ft.

not that heady, after all
Here's where miscalculations about The Market come in, as that 2007 buyer tried to flip almost immediately, asking 40% more than s/he had just paid. Like the developer five years earlier, the new flipper thought too much money was left on the table -- although this time by the original-owner-turned-2007-seller. While there is no question that The Market generally increased through 2007, that 40% premium was way more than The Market would swallow. Taking $100k off the price after 4 months did not impress anyone either, so that marketing effort ended when the listing expired after 6 months.

not that heady, either
Undaunted, though somewhat chastened, the flipper tried to flip again after The Market had definitely (in retrospect) changed, dropping the ask by another $200k, still looking for about 15% in gross profit. The flipper was way behind a declining market, and that effort expired in six months, as well.

to the present, priced at a loss from 2007
A change in agent and price shows the (by now) very chastened flipper asking 10% less than s/he paid in 2007. Ouch, indeed. Any potential buyer will argue with this flipped out flipper that 10% is not enough of a discount, but I think the flipper has finally found an asking price that should attract some interest, unlike the prior two 6-month exercises in pricing futility.

the same story, fewer words (proportionate values)
 

*the original price was not $1mm, but I am using that starting point to keep the active listing anonymous; all subsequent "prices" are closely proportionate to what happened since that beginning (in round numbers)

As I said (in all those words above), this is quite an interesting timeline, encompassing Mahanttan loft markets that showed gain to froth to pain: (1) an up market (developer searching for right price in 2002-03), (2) a frothy market (quick sale in 2007 up 45% in three+ years and an immediate attempt to flip way too high), and (3) a chastened flipper two years later trying to lose only 11%. Wonderful microcosm, I think. [arrgggh ... can't turn that italics monster off; sorry]

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 25, 2009 - am I a coward? assessing + bearing risk in a risky world

a rumination (bear with me)
I tell owners in this market that my job is to protect their equity and get them on their way (to whatever is next in their lives) with as much money in their pocket as possible. I tell them I do not determine The Market price for their loft (nor do they).  I give them my best professional judgment as to the asking price that will attract the best price available in The Market in the time frame they want. I believe that (nearly) all sellers in (nearly) all markets are afraid of 'leaving money on the table', so they are (sorely!) tempted to price high 'to see how that works', but many sellers in The (current) Market are at least as afraid of bleeding equity, by being one of the Manhattan lofts that does not sell, even after serial price drops.

not my call
Of course, it is the owner's assessment of risk that determines where a loft is priced. An owner who is more afraid of leaving money on the table than of lingering unsold in a declining market is free to make that choice (though I may choose not to work with an owner with a different assessment than I have).

brass tacks
What am I talking about?? I noticed a Manhattan loft recently to market that (a) is a pretty spectacular loft, (b) in a building I am pretty familiar with, (c) in which there is a fairly timely and extensive set of market inputs (i.e., closed sales), (d) that is offered through a very experienced and professional agent, and (e) that is priced well above where I think The Market for that building is in March 2009. I then noticed two other lofts in buildings I am well familiar with, also with fairly timely and extensive sales history, also offered through experienced and professional agents. Yes, also priced well above where I think The Market is today.

temptation is ... tempting
I assume that these experienced and professional agents have as much information about The Market as I do, so that their sellers were well informed about recent activity and -- more importantly today -- recent inactivity. I hope that they understand that (to put it softly) there is a good chance that their lofts will be perceived as outliers by potential buyers, if they are seen at all. I assume they know that many buyers will demand that these lofts demonstrate some significant plus factor (view, condition, light), beyond what is described in the listing in order to be credibly priced. Yet these well-served sellers decided to start marketing their lofts as if some serious buyers would be attracted by a price that most buyers would see as too high. Perhaps because their lofts are "unique"....
 

Mar. 24, 2009 - Manhattan loft inventory as of March 22 = 973

Number of Manhattan lofts offered for sale as of Sunday night continues to reflect a bulging inventory: 
 

This is up 13 in a week, while up 293 since my recorded low in mid-August, the fourth in a new streak of weeks in a row with record inventory in my limited data set (since June).

See my May 19 post for what I am counting, and why it is difficult.

Mar. 23, 2009 - new Manhattan loft listings + closed sales in last 7 days

• there were 25 Manhattan lofts reported as new to the market in the last 7 days and 7 as sold (after previous weeks of 12, 7, 9, 7, 3, 7, 14 and zip)
• 15 of the 25 new ones are offered between $1mm and $3mm, while all of the 7 sales were offered below $3mm 
• none of the 31 new loft listings is in new development, while 4 of the 12 closed sales were in new developments
  
  

  By price	New = 25	Sold = 7
  $500k to $999k	3	2
  $1mm to $1.99mm	11	4
  $2mm to $2.99mm	4	1
  $3mm to $3.99mm	6
  $4mm to $4.99mm	1
  $5mm+

  
   

  By neighborhood	New = 25	Sold = 7
  Battery Park City
  Chelsea	2
  Clinton
  East Village	1
  Financial District		1
  Flatiron	4	1
  Gramercy
  Greenwich Village	2
  Kips Bay	1
  Little Italy
  Lower East Side
  Morningside Heights
  Murray Hill	1
  Midtown East		1
  Midtown West
  Noho	1
  SoHo	6
  Sutton Place
  Tribeca	5	3
  Turtle Bay
  Upper East Side		1
  Upper West Side	1
  West Village	1

• 
  
   
• New loft listings in new developments

• 753 East 5 Street	1
  199 Lafayette Street	2

   
• 
  
   
• Sold lofts in new developments 

  
  

  none

  
  For information about how I get this stuff and why I slice it as I do, see methodology for New + Sold in The Last Seven Days. For my rant about how soft this data may be, see loft or not? caution: active ranting ahead.

Mar. 21, 2009 - coming attractions / next 30 days of sales report

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 20, 2009 - gutting Broome Street for $160/ft

bringing light but hiding windows?
Yesterday's New York Times On Location Home & Garden feature Bringing Light to a New York Loft profiled a Broome Street total renovation ("gutted to its floor joists and beams and totally rebuilt -- with plumbing, electricity and other systems"). The loft is a classically Long-and-Narrow with ceilings high enough to stack guest rooms over the kitchen and baths. The Times headline is a play off the fact that the space had been very dark (with a rabbit warren of rooms and black paint) but is a weird angle to take about a renovation project that essentially cuts off a lot of light.

The architect's website has another set of photos, the soho loft residential project, with this description of the project:

A "functional wall" was created along one side of the 16' high ceilinged space to house the bathrooms, laundry room and kitchen below and the guest rooms and extra storage above. The layout included new landmarks approved windows, plumbing, electrical, finishes, etc. Walnut panels and blackened steel windows and doors delineate the different spaces and create the new rooms.

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 19, 2009 - 50 Walker Street closes well off August ask after being publicly negotiable + serving bourbon

not like yesterday
The full history of the Manhattan loft #6A at 50 Walker Street will reveal just how different this marketing campaign was from the loft addressed yesterday (why be that negotiable in secret? 25 Ann Street closed nearly 25% off ask ), but for now (before the clearing price is known) the difference is sufficiently stark and (in relation to 25 Ann St) sufficiently timely to warrant a post. (Side note to the chasing-a-dream Anon from March 15: this is the kind of timely + relevant info I like to provide, but the trade-off is that it won't be complete until ACRIS is updated with the actual sale price.)

a truly spectacular loft (did a grandparent buy?)
This loft has been one of my favorites since it came to market last August, just weeks before Lehman, when the world was a different place. In fact, I have twice drafted posts about it, but have never finalized them for one reason or another.  (The part of the PruDE listing captured by StreetEasy is here.) The loft is only "1,600 sq ft", set up as a 2 bedroom, but it is (to my loft-y snobby eyes) beautifully finished and there is "1,000 sq ft" of private roof deck. As the broker-babble has it, "old Tribeca meets the 21st Century". I've had it high on my list of classic-lofts-with-outdoor-space, but haven't had one of those buyers while this has been available.

The loft was featured in a NY Times article on November 14 about a one night 4-stop loft tour with whiskey and bourbon. They served bourbon at 50 Walker Street, the last stop on the tour. Although the reporter liked the loft (it "seemed like a bargain"), one philistine 24-year-old-trader sniffed: “It’s cool, but it’s kind of like a museum,” he said. “It feels like my grandparents’ house.” Dude must have cool grandparents, no?

no secrets
Ii have watched the price history with interest, and not  a little sympathy for the owner and the experienced agents who manged this process:

• 8/13/2008  to market at $3,195,000
• 10/08/2008 drop 9% to $2,895,000
• 11/12/2008 drop 3% to $2,795,000
• 11/18/2008 drop 4% to $2,695,000
• 2/05/2009 drop 7% to $2,495,000
• 2/12/2009 contract

It was updated yesterday as Sold & Closed, ironically at about the same time I posted about the

negotiability of 25 Ann Street #4 which -- I have to believe -- cost that seller some money. Nothing secret about the intentions of the seller at #6A 50 Walker Street ... drop the price to find The Market. Assuming (optimistically) that #6A got the last ask, there is a 22% spread between start and finish (more likely, the spread will be higher when the trading price is available).

This seller recognized the problem (though not its scope) within 60 days, lopping 9% off the original price. This seller waited only another month to drop again by six figures, then tried again almost immediately, to head into the 'holiday season'. This seller then gave the New Year a chance to see if it would bring a new set of buyers and -- when it did not after 35 days of New Year -- dropped the price another $200k.

price found The Market.

No buyer that was at all interested in a loft like this could have mistaken this seller as one who would not negotiate -- the owner made four public announcements to that effect. In contrast, 25 Ann Street #4 had one price change and one change in firm over 4+ months before negotiating a deal 23% off the last asking price. My point yesterday was that they'd have done better if they had been more public about their willingness to compromise. Most buyers are likely to have interpreted the refusal to drop that price again as implying that the seller was not very negotiable.

I suspect that the buyer for #6A at 50 Walker Street did not negotiate a deep discount off the last asking price, but time (and ACRIS) will tell....

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 18, 2009 - milestone alert / Manhattan Loft Guy is 3

oh frabjous day, calloo, callay
(no idea how that chortling is spelled, and I am not going to look it up)

The first Manhattan Loft Guy post was on March 19, 2006; it has been followed by 872 others (and counting). Speaking of counting, that's 1,096 days (last year lept), or 5.6 posts per week.

Light some candles! Blow out some candles! Raise a glass! Down a glass! Flog a blog! etc, etc, etc

out of The Terrible Twos?
Year Three began (more or less) with the beginning of anonymous-listing posting, to the extent there were any posts about listings. Year Three included the quick turn from The Bull Market to whatever mess we are now in now.

Year Four will bring peace and prosperity (sorry ... wrong card). Year Four will bring more and better posts! Or, at least, more better posts. Right after this one....

 

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 18, 2009 - why be that negotiable in secret? 25 Ann Street closed nearly 25% off ask

Mar. 16, 2009 - Manhattan loft inventory as of March 15 = 960

Number of Manhattan lofts offered for sale as of Sunday night continues to reflect a bulging inventory: 
 

This is up 11 in a week, while up 280 since my recorded low in mid-August, the third in a new streak of weeks in a row with record inventory in my limited data set (since June).

See my May 19 post for what I am counting, and why it is difficult.

Mar. 16, 2009 - new Manhattan loft listings + closed sales in last 7 days

• there were 31 Manhattan lofts reported as new to the market in the last 7 days and 12 as sold (after previous weeks of 7, 9, 7, 3, 7, 14 and zip)
• 20 of the 31 new ones are offered between $1mm and $3mm, while 6 of the 12 sales were offered between $1mm and $2mm and none above $4mm
• none of the 31 new loft listings is in new development, while 4 of the 12 closed sales were in new developments
  
  

  By price	New = 31	Sold = 12
  $500k to $999k	4	2
  $1mm to $1.99mm	11	6
  $2mm to $2.99mm	9	2
  $3mm to $3.99mm	3	2
  $4mm to $4.99mm	1
  $5mm+	3

  
   

  By neighborhood	New = 32	Sold = 12
  Battery Park City
  Chelsea	3
  Clinton	1
  East Village	1
  Financial District	1	2
  Flatiron	1	1
  Gramercy	2	1
  Greenwich Village	4	1
  Kips Bay		1
  Little Italy
  Lower East Side
  Morningside Heights
  Murray Hill
  Midtown East
  Midtown West	1
  SoHo	2	1
  Sutton Place
  Tribeca	12	3
  Turtle Bay
  Upper East Side
  Upper West Side		1
  West Village	3	1

• 
  
   
• New loft listings in new developments

• none

   
• 
  
   
• Sold lofts in new developments 

  
  

  140 West 22 Street (Clement Clarke)	1
  15 East 26 Street (15 Madison Square North)	1
  60 Beach Street	2

  
  For information about how I get this stuff and why I slice it as I do, see methodology for New + Sold in The Last Seven Days. For my rant about how soft this data may be, see loft or not? caution: active ranting ahead.

© Sandy Mattingly 2009

Mar. 15, 2009 - chasing a dream or waking up from a bad dream, as they chase The Market down

stepping in a down market, easier said than done, always painful
There's a new-ish listing in an architecturally significant Manhattan loft conversion from this century that hit numerous Manhattan Loft Guy buttons: it is (another) one of those eight million stories; it was definitely too pushy; it is now priced significantly below the prior market (possibly in line with current reality).

Looks as though they did  a lovely job with the conversion, using quality finishes and creatively adapting the so-far-from-cookie-cutter spaces a few years back. Certainly, the loft is lovely. Certainly, it was priced right back in the day: it took ten days to find a contract in the original offering. Certainly, these folks have (at least) one of the eight million stories here in the big city: they started trying to flip seven months after closing, probably as unintentional flippers (in the sense that they'd have marketed immediately after closing if they had always planned to flip; 'waiting' 7 months implies a change in circumstances).

the numbers tell a story

• The developer priced this loft at almost $1,300/ft almost 3 years ago (it closed a year later)
• The new owners started flipping (started trying to flip) 7 months later, asking under $1,500/ft
• Unsuccessful after six months (and one drop of about $100/ft), they took it off the market (without, apparently, having totally abandoning the idea of a flip)
• Back on the market after another 9 months, now asking about $1,100/ft -- about $400k less than their purchase less than two years earlier

what's the story?
I may only be scenario-spinning here, but I read this trail as evidence of people unhappily but finally confronting the reality that they have to sell, come hell, high water or a significant capital loss. They spent some painful months since Summer figuring out if they really had to sell, then decided the numbers didn't work so they had to sell. Re-pricing $600k less than before looks pretty credible to me; we will see if The Market is equally respectful of their new approach.

 

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 14, 2009 - diversion for a Saturday

comedy or tragedy? you decide
My eyes almost popped out when I saw an all-agent e-blast about a new price for a Manhattan loft that happened to get through my junk filter. (Note to self: fix filters.) Then I scratched my head, not sure how to react to this sequence of price changes.

I ended up totally unsure how to frame this, but I invite you to consider the likely conversations between agent and seller implied by this history and to decide for yourself if this is farce or drama:

• new to market in January for $1.75mm
• 1 week later $1.65mm
• 2 weeks later $1.595mm
• 3 weeks later $1.495mm
• 6 weeks later (another price drop, but I don't want you identifying this loft, so I will keep that detail to myself)

Is this evidence of a preconceived plan, or of a shouting match between seller and agent?? I'd love to hear some comments on this....

© Sandy Mattingly 2009

Mar. 13, 2009 - off (only) 6% in Soho in a year? one seller thinks so

© Sandy Mattingly 2009  

Mar. 12, 2009 - 2 closings at 36 West 15 Street / one was pushing it

This loft sold 2 years ago [November 28, 2006] for $860/ft [$2mm], bragging then only about a new kitchen. The new listing is all about being newly renovated. I suspect that they did not spend $300/ft on a renovation, but never mind ... it has not sold yet as the sum of (1) the 2006 purchase price and (2) $270/ft for renovation [$2.65mm]. It will be interesting -- in a vulture kind of way -- to see where this one ends up. As that reader suggests, I will keep an eye on it.

Mar. 11, 2009 - flipping for fun, not profit, in Soho

© Sandy Mattingly 2009