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Last fall”™s stock market collapse and the fourth-quarter economic upheaval apparently spilled into the lower Hudson Valley”™s housing market in January, when sales of existing single-family houses here plummeted sharply from a year ago.
The New York State Association of Realtors (NYSAR) reported 121 house sales in Westchester in January, a nearly 53 percent decline from January 2008 and a drop of slightly more than 48 percent from December.
Putnam County saw a nearly 41 percent drop in January house sales compared to January 2008 and a nearly 33 percent decline from December. House sales in Rockland County were down about 17 percent for the month compared to January 2008 and dropped about 38 percent from December”™s sales pace. In Orange County, January sales were down about 27 percent from January 2008 and were off 31 percent from December. Ulster County”™s housing market showed the greatest December-to-January sales drop-off, at about 58 percent, and a 47 percent decline from January 2008.
Dutchess County was one of only five counties in the state where January sales were up from a year earlier. The county had sales growth of about 9 percent compared to January 2008, though first-month sales this year were down 9 percent from December.
A typically slow month for housing sales in New York”™s seasonal market was significantly slower this January. Statewide sales of single-family houses for the month dropped about 31 percent from January 2008 and about 38 percent from December, according to NYSAR”™s preliminary sales data. NYSAR CEO Duncan R. MacKenzie said it was “falling consumer confidence not falling temperatures that kept buyers from being active” this winter.
Median sales prices in January reported were: Westchester, $535,000, down about 17 percent from January 2008 and about 5 percent from December; Rockland, $414,000, down about 13 percent from January 2008 and about 3 percent from December; Putnam, $350,000, down about 5 percent year-to-year and about 8 percent from December; Dutchess, $280,000, down about 15 percent year-to-year and 1 percent from December; Orange, $259,000, down about 20 percent from January 2008 and almost unchanged from December; Ulster, $190,000, down about 21 percent year-to-year and about 19 percent from December.
Though the housing market survey reflects only one month rather than the more reliable quarterly basis for reporting sales figures, “These data show the situation is deteriorating in Westchester,” Westchester County Board of Realtors CEO P. Gilbert Mercurio said last week. The plummeting sales seem to reflect the impact of the October stock market collapse “and all the chaos that followed” on a region with a “special vulnerability” in that “so many people are employed in the financial services sector,” he said.
