Manhattan Apartments Increase to an Average Price of Over $2 Million

If you want to join the ranks of Manhattan apartment owners, you'll need to shell out an average of $2 million per apartment.

Manhattan apartments' second quarter cost was an average of $2,077,680, a 16 percent increase since last year, according to a report released Friday by real estate firm Halstead.

The big takeaways of the report were that studios and one-bedrooms are very strong throughout the marketplace, while the prices of two- to four-bedroom apartments decreased slightly, Halstead's president Richard Grossman told Patch.

New luxury developments pushed the average price of Manhattan apartments in general higher this quarter. Closing prices in new developments reached a record high of $3,786,538, 28 percent more than a year ago. The number of closings also rose sharply, up 59 percent from last year.

However, a lot of these closings were from contracts that were established a year or two ago, Grossman said.

Re-sale apartments spent longer on the market and sold for less money than second quarter last year. The apartments that sold during the quarter spent 6 percent longer on the market than a year ago, and sellers accepted 1 percent less (98.2 percent) of their last asking price than they did last year.

Apartments sold within an average of 88 days.

"We've seen that prices went a little ahead of themselves," Grossman said. "I think sellers want last year's prices and buyers want next year's prices."

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