Market reports analyzing real-estate activity in Brooklyn and Queens landed today, and it looks like outer-borough buyers have been in apartment-hunting mode. According to the Prudential Douglas Elliman/Miller Samuel survey, transactions jumped from April to June this year compared to the same time last year, when the market was flailing.
Queens saw a bigger bump, from 2,129 sales to 3,972, while Brooklyn’s numbers rose from 1,428 to 1,660. Appraiser Jonathan Miller, who prepared the reports, says tax credits for existing and first-time home buyers clearly made an impact, as did softened prices. Properties are selling a little bit faster, too: Last year, it took an average of 107 days to unload a listing in Queens; 146 in Brooklyn. This year, it’s 97 days in Queens; 103 in Brooklyn.
So there’s reason to be optimistic, albeit cautiously. The market’s no longer on the edge of a cliff, it’s more like 100 yards away — maybe even 200. But that cliff, it’s still there. Prices are still finding their groove, especially in Queens. Brooklyn’s median price is up 5 percent to $463,000 from last year’s $441,090, while Queens’s is actually down 7.5 percent from $362,000 to $335,000. And compared to the first three months of this year, median prices are down 0.6 percent in Brooklyn — essentially flat — and 2.9 percent in Queens. Price-wise, “Queens is still slipping and sliding, while Brooklyn has had three solid quarters,” said Miller.
