Another Inventory Uptick

stevie!!!!
helloooooooo

Click on the 6-month view - so far, it's barely a blip. If it continues, then you'll have something, but inventory is way down overall (but still at a fairly elevated level by historic standards).

a 2-300 uptick is meaningful? What about the deluge of properties taken off the market in the summertime that were expected to come back on post labor day? if anything the inventory numbers are a sign that things are indeed stablizing, not that they are getting worse. still about 2k off the highs.

what abut the 7,000 units of shadow inventory? true inventory is most likley around 17,000 units. How many units are being sold per month now on average?

> a 2-300 uptick is meaningful?

It certainly is when figuring out of the calls for a decline were accurate!

> still at a fairly elevated level by historic standards

And thats the point.... high, and not falling.

"And thats the point.... high, and not falling."

Again, look at the 6-month view. If you told a stats professor that the general trend is "not falling" he would immediately direct you to an optometrist.

What's this under this rock?
6500 unoccupied apartments not on the market....
well we can always rent them.
to who?

what's up with all the new Plaza inventory?

and why are they listing it as the 5th Ave address instead of 1 Central Park South like they usually do?

i've been seeing both in new listings recently. but yes, i also noticed a large number of units for the 5th Ave address.

happy, if you look at the plaza description it mentions 180 condos and 152 hotel suite condominiums. a total of 332 units. the description for the 5th avenue address mentions hotel condominium ownership. looks like the plaza has a whole lot more inventory to unload.

sorry should have provided the link.

This grand icon at Fifth Avenue and Central Park South will be home to 180 elegant condominiums, with
superb services and amenities, supported by today’s most advanced technology. In addition to The Private Residences, the Plaza will continue as a 6-star hotel with 152 of the hotel suites available for purchase as hotel condominiums.

http://www.streeteasy.com/nyc/building/768-fifth-avenue-new_york

"Again, look at the 6-month view. If you told a stats professor that the general trend is "not falling" he would immediately direct you to an optometrist"

Of course, then I'd take you to a statistician, and you're whine and cry, and given the movement over the last few years... trying to call that "falling". wow.

Cherry pick all you want, bjw. We know you don't like data unless you can slant it.

Geez, you're nasty when you want to be, huh? I clearly stated that we're at historically elevated levels, but you're calling looking at the 6-month view instead of the 1-month view "cherry-picking" and "slanting"? Sorry, that's just delusional. We know the story you want, but the market won't listen to you or anyone else - it does what it does, so there's no sense in trying to be cute about it, as you do so often.

slanted data? can I recomend a china town optometrist?

oh f'k...... falco... that might bring up the "cat scratch your piggie eyes out girl"..... better lay low for awhile... ouch..

let's not wait for the cat scratch your eyes out girl

Hey a**hole. That's you, falco. Three things. First, f**k you. Second, f**k you. Third, there is no room on this board for racists. Or homophobes, or anti-Semites or the various other sorts of lowlife who appear from time to time. Congratulations on joining the StreetEasy varsity ignorance team. A**hole.

So Mr. Openminded is going on on another thread about not being homophobic. Congratu-f**king-lations.

http://www.streeteasy.com/nyc/talk/discussion/15068-who-needs-a-roller-coaster-i-got-money-invested-in-the-stock-mkt-yipppeeeeee

Sure you don't want to go for double points - bigoted and homophobic?

"Geez, you're nasty when you want to be, huh? I clearly stated that we're at historically elevated levels, but you're calling looking at the 6-month view instead of the 1-month view "cherry-picking" and "slanting"? Sorry, that's just delusional. We know the story you want, but the market won't listen to you or anyone else - it does what it does, so there's no sense in trying to be cute about it, as you do so often."

whine, whine, whine. You really add so much here.

Folks might also want to think about which segments of the market are seeing significant growth in inventory. There's a very nice chart from Miller Samuel showing that on the East Side inventory is relatively low for properties under .5 million, but the backlog increases pretty steadily as you move up the ladder.

http://www.millersamuel.com/charts/gallery-view.php?ViewNode=1252894827clWhn&Record=0

So the sale of significant numbers of inexpensive properties which can get conforming loans and are eligible for the new home-buyer tax credit are sustaining the low end of the market, and taking a big chunk out of the absolute number of properties on the inventory, but inventory and prices at the high end continue to stagnate.

You might also take a look at this chart.
http://www.millersamuel.com/charts/gallery-view.php?ViewNode=1168398636CGNLt&Record=11

Just under 9600 now...
http://www.urbandigs.com/charts.html

Woops, 9270 now...

Seems the post labor day surge is being gobbled up. Is this the second leg?

As was said before, if the uptick continued, the OP would have a case, but looks like inventory is fairly stable since the minor uptick at the end of August. Yes, still historically high, but not the story some wishful thinkers want to paint.

Flamo. WTF r u still tracking re spinniker? Eat a bowl of NYC re nervous this morning?

Herez a little theory. Lots of talk about WS bonus. Could it be the ladies are primping and shopping at Victorias secret for a coming out party after march/April 2010. I mean these ppl have been sideline sellers for 1yr and there's a pot of gold if they can hold on 6 more months. Wouldn't u max your gold card to get to the finish line?

The number of new contracts is running at a quite brisk rate as well.

What ru so worried about 67?? You've got the world by the nuts and ready to pounce at the moment doom sets in. Relax and watch the show.

w67th you moron. There are 3 years worth of buyers sitting on the sidelines with more cash in the bank than recent history. They also see historically low lending rates, and prices bottomed out.

The next bubble isnt forming. It's here....

1 in 5 Americans are planning on buying a home next year...didnt see that news?

since there were only a certain number of contract signings yesterday, and inventory fell significantly, it appears as though sellers took their units off the market for the holidays. i've been going through my saved open house searches, from the one 6 weeks ago, two out of 20 units are listed in contract, 2 are unavailable.

it's amazing that with all this money being pumped into the system that things aren't significantly stronger. unemployment, i guess.

btw, it's always a good time to buy in a bubble. very wise investment strategy. at least the bulls of old tried to argue fundamentals, not just an asset bubble. they used to laugh at asset bubble theory. also btw, mishkin just said that irrational exuberance asset price bubbles aren't as damaging. if you believe that, please do continue to be irrationally exuberant.

It's 5% of americans not 1 in 5. Didn't YOU see the news?

http://www.cnbc.com/id/33850710

And I am one of those buyers sitting on the sidelines with more cash in the bank than any of my history and it will stay there for 3 more years if it has to.
Rentals are just so much more attractive than purchasing.

"There are 3 years worth of buyers sitting on the sidelines with more cash in the bank than recent history. They also see historically low lending rates, and prices bottomed out."

Where is the evidence for this? Other than low rates, none of this seems accurate at all. Not surprising given the source.

If the bubble years consisted of reduced inventory with competing bids and rapidly escalating prices, where should inventory be to support a more balanced and sustainable market? We have about a years worth of inventory at current absorption rates and that to me seems pretty healthy.

BJW you dont know about all the personal and commercial cash on the sidelines? are you that much of a tool that you dont know the single most important factor in today's market that has been written about by pretty much every outlet?

Or do you just pose as a tool? no one could be that uninformed...

petrfitz, nope, there is obviously cash on the sidelines, but you're claiming there's "3 years' worth" and "more cash in the bank than recent history." Prove it. Instead of calling people names - that just exposes you for a classless slumlord that you appear to be.

god you are such aa tool BJW. no wonder you work in souless health insurance field and bought in Williamsburg at the height of the market and the epicenter of the disaster....

total active inventory for manhattan is closer to 8924...from why my data now shows..we are very confident in our new data, for the new urbandigs that is coming...ill just tell you data was a complete mess, and took forever to clean up and calculate properly

spin, if you pull up buildings and look at transaction histories during the bubble years you see a very different pattern of listing and delisting. apartments generally sold. now, often, they don't. it may be that some of those sellers have been testing the market, but i'd bet many haven't been able to sell. some have rented out those units, but likely they'll be back.

bubble doesn't just mean inventory, or lack thereof.

petro, how concentrated is that wealth? will it buy the 2/2 in midtown east? will it buy studios in FiDi? have the owners of such abundant resources already bought, and if they're looking to buy again, will it be at the Plaza? tell me, oh one who has such a magnificent grasp on figures and statistics. 1 in 20 vs. 1 in 5.

> BJW you dont know about all the personal and commercial cash on the sidelines?

wow, perfitz is even dumber than I thought.

You clearly haven't seen or don't understand the commercial numbers. The market is TANKING there. Properties are being sold for as much as 67% off of previous (like world wide plaza, which is office and residential).

Vacancy are up big time. Effective rents are down as much as 50% by some broker estimates (from Crain's).

And nobody is buying in.

Commercial, funny.

petrfitz, when did I say I work in health insurance (although it is a pretty relevant topic right now)? And thanks for proving my point - you have NO facts, just pointless insults. Congratulations.

And of those 5%, 1/4 of them think prices have bottomed out. That's 1 in 80.
That's 1 and 1/4 percent of buyers!
One shmuck and his dumber kid.

"Roughly a quarter of potential buyers said the No. 1 reason they would buy now is because prices have bottomed out."
http://www.cnbc.com/id/33850710

petrfitz, maybe you missed the cover story on CRE at Business Week:
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/09_46/b4155042792563.htm

and from the CNBC source:

"Just one in twenty Americans say they plan to buy a home within the next year, and they're most likely to be 34 years old or younger and living in the South or West, according to a survey released Wednesday."

if you're in the south and west, prices may be close to bottoming out depending on where you are.

AR - I would say low inventory was the fuel for the fire. I wouldn't expect to see similar listing patterns as we did in those years. We all know where it got us.

about - you've been beating the delisted apartments will all go back on the mkt drum since the spring. yet where are they? you only had the typical seasonal uptick after labor day, with the corresponding seasonal downtick now as some of those have closed.
if so many owners were in the financial distress that you claim they are, they would be much more aggressive about selling. and while foreclosures are up, the base is so small that it is pretty meaningless overall.
it appears that many just put their place out there to see if they could get near peak prices. once they realised that wasn't the case, they took it off. you even hear a lot of that anecdotaly on the site, about how unrealistic many sellers are.

i know it distresses you that more NYers aren't choking on their mtges, but the evidence points the other way. prices troughed and inventory peaked in the spring. we had a very small bounce in price, and things appear pretty stable for now, and have been for many months.

I prefer to be called the opposite of less on.

Don't forget the zillow stat.. that 1/3 of owners want to sell their homes, just waiting for prices to recover... no better way to drag this thing out.

somewhere, you've always quoted 2/3 of owners would want to sell their homes if prices rose significantly. What happened?

Thank you Noah, it's really interesting to be wrong. I really thought the inventory would jump after Labor Day, and we'd have another leg down ( not as big as the first one, but significant.)
From the anecdotal side of saved listings, I could see that 1-there wasn't much new listings in my saved searches, and 2- the nicer properties were going into contract pretty much within 10% of asking.
I am somewhat resigned that I'll have to wait quite a while to find better values. What is your educated guess? I'm wondering if we'll have much of a trough if the government props up values until employment picks up again.

yw - its not that you were wrong, I have a different data source, not streeteasy, that I am using to build my new systems on

ewwww kewl... so you're pulling directly from that mysterious "brokers eyes only" system? Or whatever its called.

http://www.urbandigs.com/charts.html

More evidence of pretty poor inventory "uptick" calls, even taking the seasonality into consideration. Will be interesting to see what happens in January.

bjw, that looks like an uptick in the wrong direction. Maybe nyc10022 was making his predictions while standing on his head?

Juice, makes you wonder if he makes all of his decisions while in compromising positions. I kid, I kid. But really, a drop of nearly 2,500 apartments in 6 months is quite notable. Still worth noting that we're at a more normal level of inventory only now. And while people railing about "shadow" inventory tend to exaggerate, there is certainly some of that coming. I happen to think it'll be a fairly slow process though, instead of a massive dumping of units on the free market.

hee hee.

Inventory 7352

JM, apples and oranges, as you are talking about the new, improved, cleaned-up and checked-out UrbanDigs' numbers vs. the Streeteasy version.
Apples to apples:
March 3, 2010: inventory, 7,392; pending sales, 2030
March 3, 2011: inventory, 7,404; pending sales, 2061

maly, as far as i remember the market did pretty well last spring. so if we are in the same position now, i think thats a good thing.

The market was very strong last spring, but I suspect the tax credit and Federal cheerleading had quite a bit to do with it. We'll see! So far, inventory and activity are steady.

and this year we have higher growth and better employment, and overall more confidence. i think we'll be ok

it's certainly possible.

YOY, we're definitely flat as maly noted. But based on when the OP made the "another uptick" comment (~10/09), inventory has dropped by nearly 1,500.

> March 3, 2010: inventory, 7,392; pending sales, 2030
> March 3, 2011: inventory, 7,404; pending sales, 2061

Oh, poor, poor juice... trouble with numbers again....

Inventory when swe made his "another uptick" and "not falling" comments: 8,746
Inventory today: 7,391

Trouble with numbers? Major whoops...

September 3 2009 - 7450 Inventory, 2360 Pending Sales
March 5 2011 - 7415 Inventory, 2050 Pending Sales

I'll say it again...
"It certainly is when figuring out of the calls for a decline were accurate!"

I just want to throw out a 3rd variable - OFF MKT TRENDS over the past year. When considering this, it completes the picture for us to make an interpretation.

http://www.urbandigs.com/chart.php?s1=Off+Mkt&s2=&mindt=03%2F08%2F2010&maxdt=03%2F08%2F2011&t=Market+Trends&interval_mindt=2010%2F03%2F08

OFF MKT trends are down 37% in the last 12 months. With such a move down in pace of listings being removed from market, that puts UPWARD pressure on ACTIVE inventory. Makes sense right. If off mkt trends fall 36%, I would expect inventory to rise noticeably. But what if the pace of new inventory these past few months, is much lower than when it was a year ago? Like it is right now. The fact that monthly pace of new contracts signed is so close to 2010's level so far, to me at least, tilts the notch one level higher signaling a strong market.

Is my math right here??

urbandigs, a drop in off mkt trend could also indicate that sellers cannot wait any longer and must sell for whatever reason. That could result in a positive for volume but a negative for prices.

Noah, interesting stuff. What do you think would cause the off-market?

the off-market stat is interesting. Sunday's bear interpretation may be right. Similarly, there may be a bullish interpretation, which is that as these sellers see absorption rising (few new listings coming on, but contracts still being signed) they may being staying on market figuring that there is less competition and now it is their "turn."

I think more likely, the old listings that have been passed over pretty much stay passed over, and buyers and sellers meet in the middle of the trickle of new listing that get signed right as they come on. That's a bullish interpretation too, giving us slightly rising prices on "medium" active volume even as there's a perma-encrustation of listings that get stale and don't sell.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

urbandigs, how do account for the possibility of changes in listing agents' behavior with regards to their willingness to update their listings? Have you encountered any noteworthy differences in the quality of the data you are receiving over the past 18 months? If so, do you adjust historical data to compensate?

Sunday, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think urbandigs' point is that you would expect your scenario to play out, but it simply hasn't yet. Hence the "strong market" comment. I'm not sure I totally agree on the "strong" qualifier, but it seems like things are pretty tight - hard to deny the inventory data that he's putting out. Really solid stuff.

I think I agree with Ali on this one: "I think more likely, the old listings that have been passed over pretty much stay passed over, and buyers and sellers meet in the middle of the trickle of new listing that get signed right as they come on. That's a bullish interpretation too, giving us slightly rising prices on "medium" active volume even as there's a perma-encrustation of listings that get stale and don't sell. "

"urbandigs, how do account for the possibility of changes in listing agents' behavior with regards to their willingness to update their listings? Have you encountered any noteworthy differences in the quality of the data you are receiving over the past 18 months?"

Actually, we find the data to be getting better. Its as if brokers are updating with a bit more frequency, at least that is what we found a few months ago when we briefly looked at the trend internally. We also found the ACRIS sale date to filing date lag to narrow in the last few years. It seems in general, things are getting better.

As it is now, in order for a listing to be counted as OFF MKT, it must ONLY move from an ACTIVE state to one of two OFF MKT states (totm, potm)...Then, its only counted as OFF MKT for a period of 270 days. Once a listing is OFF MKT for longer than 270 days without a change in status, it no longer is counted as OFF MKT inventory on our platform.

swe - Im in the camp that in general, less product is coming to market compared to levels seen a year ago. Thats first. Second, the market is active and pace of new deals signed is only slightly below last year - but thats a sign of strength if new deals level is near last years with 25% less product coming to market. Finally, why would sellers take a listing off mkt if inventory is tight and traffic/bids are coming in? Or the perception of bids ultimately will come in? I think sellers feel confident right now, and are leaving property on the market to sell OR are going to contract. Less are failing to sell and then going off mkt...

urbandigs, I would expect the quality to be better over time. Are there "noteworthy differences" differences that could result in an orange to tangerine comparison (not quite apples and oranges). I am not asking the question as a bear or bull.

bjw2103/urbandigs, "strong market" in terms of volume or price?

"the old listings that have been passed over pretty much stay passed over"

Most people eventually settle at some point. The question is how many will make that decision at the same time (same season). The appearance of a stronger market could trigger that decision.

Could someone please explain what "off market" means?

Is this a cumulative number? Since when? 1970?

Thanks!

i dont like to talk about strong market in terms of price...median is all over the place, different trends for different nhoods

Im referring to volume trends

Topper - NO! Off Market Inventory on urbandigs.com is a POOL of listings that in the last 9 months has moved from an ACTIVE state to a OFF-MKT state in rolex (totm - temp off the market, or potm - perm off the market).

If a listing is OFF MKT for longer than 9 months, it drops out of the off-mkt inventory. Thats exactly why we need to have rules for each metric. if we didnt, off-mk would be 10,000 or so and would count a listing years and years ago that switch from active to off mkt.

Sunday, I don't actually think it's a "strong" market; was just quoting urbandigs. If anything, it looks like things are more stable than they were not that long ago. I don't expect rising interest rates to do any favors to pricing.

Since "strong market" refer to volume, we'll just have to wait and see whether front_porch or myself is right. Unlike brokers/agents, I care more about prices than volume.

Sunday, I think there are actually different micro-markets, and I don't know which one you're in. "Starter" markets, anecdotally, we're seeing very little volume at all: I can talk to Elliman, Corcoran, and I hear the same story .. you can count the number of visitors to a $500K listing on one hand. Effectively no way to call price, because practically no volume of trades -- but if I had to call it, I'd say prices declining.

OTOH, what I would call the "trade-up" market, $1mm, $1.5mm, is flying off the shelves, and we see volume decent and prices strengthening.

ali r.
DG Neary Realty

Ali - its funny you say that. According to our Pending sales breakdown by price point, in the LAST QTR we see:

<$1m --> down 0.9%
$1m-$2m --> up 10.5%
$2m-$5m --> up 18.9%
$5m+ --> up 5.1%

The low end market is by far underperforming in the tick up these past 3-4 months!

It shows exactly what i was expecting. Multi millionaires are doing fine & better than ever while the rest of America is struggling.

' Multi millionaires are doing fine & better than ever while the rest of America is struggling.'

always

Wasn't the under 1M market holding up the strongest before the recent uptick?

swe, "And thats the point.... high, and not falling."

"Just under 9600 now"

"Don't forget the zillow stat.. that 1/3 of owners want to sell their homes, just waiting for prices to recover... no better way to drag this thing out."

hee hee hee. Looks like you were wrong swe, very wrong.

bob420 - not really in this latest uptick. Its actually be consistently been lagging behind. The last time it really led, was mid & late 2009, and then again in early 2010..

But to build those charts, that is the issue. Our platform was not initially engineered to do that. So we have been working on a new chart UI for the past 10-11 weeks now. I stopped talking about new prod releases and upgrades because this sh*t always has unexpected integrity issues lurking underneath and other functionality challenges that need to be fixed. its a part of life in this world.

anyway, the new UI will allow you way more functionality in comparing submarket to broader market and price point to neighborhood. We are adding coop, condo, townhouse search options too. But with real time analytics and more inputs, you get a huge multiple of new worthless chart combinations that are possible; i.e., charts with not enough data to be worthwhile. So we are tackling that problem now so the system wont allow the user to have the option to select a chart combination that doesnt have a pre-determined amount of data to display.

I think we are in an unusual time where the tail is the wagging the dog.
The tail being the stalemate, that 1000/1050 price per sq ft average for manhattan.
I think buyers are trying to buy 10% lower, sellers 10% higher, and inventory, up or down has become more or less that red light / green light brazillian chruascaria system.

1)You can go red and just keep the meat away until your ready to eat some more (off market)
2)You can go green, still not be hungry and hopefully wait for the one choice you love (international buyer)
3)You can go green, eat for as long as you can, after a certain amount of time,just pay the bill.

> hee hee hee. Looks like you were wrong swe, very wrong

Only if you don't get, well, math...

> March 3, 2010: inventory, 7,392; pending sales, 2030
> March 3, 2011: inventory, 7,404; pending sales, 2061

Of course, we know what category Juice has been in for a long time... the losing one.

Tell us now, Juice, is going from 7,392 to 7,404 "falling"?

Just like the market would never go down 10%, right juice?

Too easy.

"Inventory when swe made his "another uptick" and "not falling" comments: 8,746
Inventory today: 7,391"

somewhere, tell us again how that's "not falling." Too easy indeed.

Swe, not falling at 8746 and what is it now? Hee hee

Maybe you should find us some more median co-op data to answer some condo performance questions. Just can't let go of the sky is falling agenda. Priceless.

Inventory looks to be ramping up a bit of late. Pretty seasonal pattern, following last year to a t, so can probably expect peaking out mid-late June, perhaps a bit higher than last summer's peak (just under 8k).

Q1 over in a week, let's wait for those numbers before we give up on the rash of renovation threads :)

http://www.urbandigs.com/chart.php?s1=Active&s2=Pending+Sales&mindt=03%2F24%2F2010&maxdt=03%2F24%2F2011&t=Market+Trends&interval_mindt=2010%2F12%2F23

Active to Pending Sales trends last 1 QTR