The 300-Day-Old NYC Listings Suddenly Seeing Bidding Wars

Photo-illustration: brake; Getty Images Photos

As Lillian Norcross saw the studio at Gramercy Park, he had already been on the market for more than 100 days. He had an older renovation, with a kitchen that would need update, but it was in a pre-war building with a full-time porter and a roof terrace. At $ 370,000, it was also the only Gramercy studio that she could afford. Because it was at the end of December, during the holidays, she had to wait a few weeks until she could see him in person, and in the meantime, she imagined to live there. “The studios are so small, you have to imagine it,” she says. “And I really loved the apartment.” She also supposed, quite reasonably, that she had a little room to negotiate, because she had been on the market for some time, and slightly offered the requested price. The seller accepted. When an inspection revealed that electricity should be improved – some kitchen devices would not work – the seller agreed to upgrade. Then Norcross learned that there was a competing offer: the full price requested and the other buyer would take the apartment as is.

“I was shocked,” explains Norcross. “Especially after making an offer and it was accepted.” His real estate agent, Laura Cook by Keller Williams NYC, was less surprised. In fact, several of his older lists were also in the middle of the blue auction wars. One, a big square Sutton a room With a terrace, he went to the market in early November by asking $ 695,000. He generated some first offers, but nothing has happened. Then, in January, several offers entered, triggering an auction war and a sale on the requested price. A Upper West Side studio Registered for $ 400,000 Above the same time, an early offer fell and then, for months, nothing. Then, in February, he suddenly had three. A broker called to ask if Cook planned to lower the price soon. “I said to myself:” No, we actually have several offers. »»

A spacious room on Sutton Place which was listed this fall, as shown in the list photos, attracted several offers in January, apparently unexpected, in the end, in the end of the contract for the requested price.
Photo: Keller Williams NYC

This is a phenomenon that Manhattan brokers say they have recently lived – after watching their lists languish for several months up to almost a year, they suddenly find themselves aligning several competing offers and even for sale for the price requested. “I have experienced it four or five times in recent months,” said Leslie Hirsch, agent of the international real estate group of Christie. “Lists where we have reached more than 100 days on the market and we are trying to find strategies, visits, price reductions – then, unexpectedly, several offers.” Hirsch and his colleague Howard Morrel had a luxury condo with two bedrooms with two bathrooms in a grand-rang on the market for more than 180 days. A neighbor of the building began to turn when the price went from $ 3.2 million to $ 2.8 million in October, then disappeared. In January, when they finally obtained an offer, the neighbor plunged with a counter-option, then a third buyer appeared. “It was so dramatic and unusual,” explains Hirsch. Generally, auction wars occur from the start or after a sharp drop in prices. Not without reason at all.

What is going on exactly? This is largely summed up with the repercussions of the strange housing market in the era of the cocvid: after years of low inventories and high interest rates, buyers reluctantly accept that things do not improve as if by magic. Now there is a lot of repressed request and not much to choose. “The supply and demand are both increasing from year to year. But the supply is up 10% and demand has increased by 30%, ”explains John Walkup, co-founder of Urban Digs. “You have these frustrated buyers, and they all look for value nuggets.” And so far, the brokers say, there has been no flood of large spring inventories, so buyers seem to return to announcements that have been overlooked when they came to the market or dropped the first offers and lost momentum. “During the fall, contract signatures increased 11% to 28% in Manhattan,” said Keller Williams NYC agent William Krooss Tadas. “It was not much, but nothing happened on the market, so even these small quarters made it difficult for buyers to take an apartment.”

This Upper West Side studio, as indicated in list photos, was at a good price and well maintained. Tate Kelly broker scored it last spring and dropped the price last July. He received no offer at the time but found himself in an auction war in October.
Photo: Coldwell Banker Warburg

Brokers for house hunters now do everything they can make a jump on good announcements. “Lately, I was flooded from” in search of emails “other brokers,” explains Tate Kelly, associated broker at Coldwell Banker Warburg, who until now, at least, has not seen a rush of new spring lists. He recently managed a war of tender to three on a Pre-West studio on the side of the Upper West West It had been on the market for 200 days. It was, in his words, “well maintained, nothing wrong with that, a very good price.” Despite this, he did not move at $ 425,000, and in July, the seller dropped the price at $ 415,000. He wins until October, when a lowball offer arrived. The seller was unfortunately reflected when another offer appeared, then another. He finally went on a contract for the full price of $ 415,000, and as soon as the contract died, he had another offer – although everyone was exhausted at that time to entertain him.

But the phenomenon may not be entirely random either. The brokers say that that they have noticed about the old lists that suddenly enter the wars of tenders, is that they have become, as Hirsch says, “the best offers wherever they were.” Although it may seem confusing to buyers who have exhausted from an agreement for an apartment, nothing special that has been seated for months, brokers say that when you really look at the inventory, these ads are “a little better than alternatives”, according to Tadas. He recently represented a couple who made an offer of $ 700,000 on a modest Two -bedroom moringside heights This had been listed at $ 750,000 for more than 100 days. Soon, they faced three other tenderers and ended up signing a contract for 98.5% of the price requested “on a property that has been on the market for more than 100 days, which is crazy,” he said. (Another of his buyers had A list of more than 300 days The 34th Street was stolen under them by an offer of any currency which, they were told, was above the requested price.)

The Salon of the two bedrooms of Morningsoide Heights, as shown in the list photos, was a little more pleasant than the competition, and the customers of Tadas ended up paying almost the full demand despite the market for more than 100 days.
Photo: Corcoran

There are also some subtle signals in the home jump process that could trigger a wave of offers. An interested buyer arriving at an unexpected open day or rushing through the door to accommodate another performance could feel stimulated in action. Several brokers with whom I spoke also suspected that the brokers of the sellers had bought the offers of their customers – reaching out to previous tenderers or other interested parties to design an auction war. But, adds Tadas, it also depends on the state of mind of the buyer, and he says that there are two types: those who will go to something really resonates with them, and those who are determined to buy now. Buyers “need to buy now” will examine all the options of their tiny market segment – that is to say Morningsoide Heights with two beds of less than $ 800,000 – and opt for the best. If there are two or three of these motivated buyers in the same small swimming pool, it could well cause an auction war.

While rents continue to increase, more apartment hunters also become the second type of buyer. A 33 -year -old investor in investor who rents $ 4,575 a month in the Upper East Side told me that she was motivated to buy after her owner announced a 15% rent – she had already thought that the apartment was too expensive. “I saved money and decided that the purchase was good use,” she said. She was one of the tenderers on the $ 695,000 list of Sutton Place de Cook – she offered $ 725,000 but was overbid and went to a room at 72nd and First Avenue, another post -war cooperative with a terrace, requesting $ 795,000. She didn’t want to miss anymore, so she offered $ 800,000, even if it needed work. She was overbid with an offer of $ 850,000 in any other, but the inscribing broker, who lives in the building, told her that the board of directors really prefers buyers with mortgages, because the bank is on the hook for the costs if something is happening. It has increased its offer to $ 810,000 and is now on a contract.

Norcross, the buyer who brought to the Gramercy studio, decided to withdraw instead of increasing his offer. She feared that electrical problems would be expensive to solve and did not want to counter it more and have to assume who costs herself. “It was definitely a frustrating process,” she said. “It took a cropping of my mind to remove it from this apartment.” She is now under contract on a Lenox Hill studio that she also saw during the holidays but was not sold initially (she had been delighted to stay in Gramercy, where she rented). But after losing the Gramercy studio, she returned to the Upper East Side One. He had also been on the market for more than 100 days, but he didn’t need work, so she made an offer in Ask. There was another offer, of course. But, fortunately, she says, “They accepted mine.”