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Price Cuts, Upper Manhattan Boom Define the Decade in Townhouse Sales

In New York City, more houses are selling, at lower prices

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Brownstone townhouses in the Greenwich Village

Marcaux / Getty Images
Brownstone townhouses in the Greenwich Village
Marcaux / Getty Images

Townhouse sales are booming in northern Manhattan and northwest Brooklyn, shifting the landscape of a market equated with the lavish, historic mansions of the Upper East Side, according to two reports released on Thursday.

The number of townhomes sold in northern Manhattan has tripled over the past decade, stealing market share away from more exclusive Manhattan neighborhoods, according to a report covering the market from 2008-2017 from Douglas Elliman prepared by appraisal firm Miller Samuel.

Northern Manhattan—which includes Harlem and Washington Heights—accounted for 40% of all townhouse sales in Manhattan in 2017, up from 23% in 2008. Rising demand for houses uptown has caused the median price to more than double over the past decade, according to the data.

More homes sold, for less

By contrast, the city’s most luxurious townhouses have seen less exciting growth,marred by unrealistic pricing. While the number of annual sales of luxury townhouses has nearly doubled since 2008, the median price has plummeted 44%.

Luxury sellers are still having to discount their homes significantly—10% in 2017—to make a sale. Other sellers have pulled some of the most outrageously overpriced homes off the market, which has caused Manhattan’s townhouse inventory to plummet, according to Douglas Elliman’s report.

Stribling & Associates, which also released a townhouse report on Thursday covering the second half of 2017, noted as well the mismatch in what sellers want and what buyers are willing to pay in the end.

"When you look at the average asking price of available inventory compared to the average price of properties sold, the differences are astronomical," said Garrett Derderian, director of data and reporting at Stribling.

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The average size of townhouses sold has gotten smaller and smaller over the decade due to the boom in uptown transactions, since houses uptown tend to have a smaller footprint than the larger ones in places like Lenox Hill and the Upper West Side.

Meanwhile, townhouse sales are also shifting to trendy northwest Brooklyn, according to a report from Stribling & Associates.

For instance Brooklyn townhouses were selling three times as fast as those on the Upper East Side.