Where Have All the Sellers Gone?

Today's residential real estate market is shaped by an ongoing and overriding lack of inventory. All analytics point to the lowest level of supply in more than 10 years. While values are up, the number of apartments for sale continues to shrink.

Take a look at how this breaks down on the Upper West Side, according to price and number of bedrooms for apartments in prewar doorman buildings:

Properties in all price ranges are being absorbed, or sold, faster than new properties are coming to market. According to a recent report by real estate appraiser Michael Vargas, it will take 4.1 months to exhaust the current supply of available properties in Manhattan. The absorption rate, calculated by dividing the total number of available homes by the average number of sales per month, varies in different areas of the city. For the Upper West Side, the rate is 2.9 months-the lowest in all Manhattan. Historically a balanced market would have six to nine months of supply.

While greater inventory heralds a buyer's market, today sellers have the clear advantage.

Hackel is a NYRS ® broker for Warburg Realty. Contact her at shackel@warburgrealty.com