Residential real estate sales in both Westchester and Putnam counties in 2009 dropped 12 percent from the previous year. It was the lowest sales volume for the region since 1993.
In a year marked by “deep recession” in the region”™s real estate market, sales activity did increase with each quarter, according to the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service Inc. (WPMLS). The 1,823 fourth-quarter property closings in Westchester amounted to a 31 percent increase from the fourth quarter of 2008. That pattern has “established a momentum for improved conditions in 2010,” Westchester Putnam Association of Realtors CEO P. Gilbert Mercurio said in his analysis for the WPMLS report.
In a similar pattern, Westchester sales prices also dropped for the year, though median prices improved quarterly against higher 2008 prices. Mercurio said there was “a clear trend line through 2009 toward price recovery rather than price decreases.” If the trend continues, first-quarter sales prices this year might be slightly higher than in the first quarter of 2009.
In Westchester, 3,353 single-family houses were sold in 2009, down from 5,171 house sales in the peak year of 2007 and a nearly 12 percent decline from 2008, when 3,805 houses were sold. The median sale price for a single-family house last year was $580,000, a 15 percent drop from the 2007 peak, when the median sale price in Westchester was $685,000. The 2009 median price was down nearly 11 percent from 2008.
The condominium and co-op markets in 2009 saw steeper declines in sales volume. The 821 condo closings were down more than 18 percent from the 1,005 closings reported in 2008, A total of 1,268 co-ops were sold last year, a nearly 18 percent decline from 2008. The 2009 median sale price for a condo was $355,000, down nearly 8 percent from 2008. The median sale price for co-ops was $175,000, down about 5 percent from 2008.
Sales of two- to four-family houses rose in 2009 to 382, an increase of more than 33 percent from 2008. The median sale price for multifamily dwellings, though, dropped to $370,000, a 20 percent decrease from 2008.
The WPMLS report noted Westchester”™s relatively stable inventory of properties for sale kept market values from plunging precipitously as they have in other parts of the nation. The county ended the year with an inventory of 5,380 residential properties, including 2,909 single-family houses, a level almost unchanged from the end of 2008. Mercurio in his analysis said the greatest control on inventory here is “the willingness and ability of potential home sellers to stay out of the market until conditions improve.”
The apparent nascent recovery in the real estate market could be derailed in 2010 by obstacles such as increased mortgage interest rates, continued unemployment and stock market reversals, the WPMLS report cautioned. David Wind, president of Guaranteed Home Mortgage Co. in Harrison, recently predicted mortgage rates will climb to 6.5 percent to 7 percent in three to four months, posing a hardship for homeowners who have not converted adjustable-rate mortgages to fixed-rate financing while interest rates remain low.
Mercurio called the high unemployment rate in 2009 that will probably continue into 2010 “the most worrisome threat to the area”™s real estate market.” That could lead to increased foreclosure filings and a rise in short sales and lender-owned properties that could create a glut of inventory and send residential prices downward.
