Brooklyn notched an all-time high median sales price in the second quarter, thanks to pent-up demand and scarce inventory in two of its hottest neighborhoods.
Sellers appeared to be holding tight to their low-interest homes as inventory in the borough fell 7.6 percent year-over-year, according to a report by Compass.
The supply crunch, coupled with consumer demand for pricy North Brooklyn condos, pushed the median sales price in the borough to just shy of $1 million.
“Demand for first-time buyers is greater in North Brooklyn than other areas,” Compass agent Lior Barak said.
The activity in Williamsburg and Greenpoint has been driven by new development sales, according to Barak, who said he does roughly 80 percent of his business in Brooklyn. The Real Deal reported in 2022 that developers filed 230 condo plans in Greenpoint, outpacing any other neighborhood that year by at least 100.
In Greenpoint and Williamsburg, condo sales rose from 175 in the second quarter of last year to 284 this year, an increase of over 62 percent. The sales bump corresponded with a nearly 33 percent year-over-year rise of the median price to $1.3 million.
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Helping drive interest, the report said, was “a noticeable trend of buyers seeking homes that offer amenities and services that are commensurate to their investment.”
The strong performance of condos in North Williamsburg led to an overall sales increase of 4.6 percent year-over-year, and smoothed the edges of an otherwise bumpy quarter, as sales fell across Northwest Brooklyn, Southwest Brooklyn and South Brooklyn.
In contrast to the strong topline sales numbers, contracts across the borough fell 11.5 percent year-over-year, the ninth straight quarterly decline. Condos had the biggest dropoff, at 16.6 percent, while houses fell by just 4.6 percent.
Many of the closed condos in the second quarter were from new developments that had been on the market since 2021 or 2022, Barak said of the discrepancy between sales and contracts last quarter. New developments can take significantly longer to close than resales.
Low inventory was not endemic across listing categories, as the $2 to $3 million market saw a year-over-year increase in listings, reaching a 22.5 percent inventory market share, the highest on record. The Brooklyn report stands in contrast to Elliman’s recent Manhattan Q2 report, which found that inventory rose for the first time in five quarters in the face of an impending election and still-high interest rates.