What’s Next for New York City Real Estate?

By CHRISTINE HAUGHNEY
Published: January 13, 2008

LOOKING back, 2007 was supposed to be the year that the Manhattan residential real estate market slowed down and began to look a bit more like the slumping national market.

Michael Falco for The New York Times

But that didn’t happen. While there were periods when condominiums and co-ops sat unsold because buyers and sellers couldn’t agree on prices, the year ended with the average price of a Manhattan apartment rising to a record $1.4 million, though the number ballooned in part because so many wealthy buyers purchased extraordinarily expensive condos.
No one is predicting that 2008 will be a repeat of 2007. The sprawling pieds-à-terre may still sell for millions at the Plaza and 15 Central Park West, but in general, economists are predicting that prices will drop in some segments of the market and in some neighborhoods around the city.
“New York has had a very good run, and there are still a lot of people sitting around with cash,” said Christopher Mayer, the Paul Milstein professor of real estate at Columbia Business School. “But that doesn’t last forever.”

For full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/realestate/13cov.html?_r=1&ref=realestate&oref=slogin