New Jersey Real Estate Report

No Pumpkins, not Halloween.

From the FT:

US home price gains hit new record for fourth straight month

The increase in US home prices continued to accelerate in July, setting an annual record for the fourth straight month as strong demand and a dearth of available properties sent values soaring.

Home prices were up 19.7 per cent nationally compared with the same month last year, the biggest gain on record dating back to 1988, according to the S&P Corelogic Case-Shiller index. That surpassed the previous record set in June, when prices rose 18.7 per cent year on year.

“The last several months have been extraordinary, not only in the level of price gains but in the consistency of gains across the country,” said Craig Lazzara, managing director and global head of index investment strategy at S&P Dow Jones Indices.

Property values in 10 major markets grew 19.1 per cent versus a year ago, while the 20-city index jumped 19.9 per cent.

Seventeen of those 20 cities posted higher annual growth rates when compared to June. Home prices in all but one of those markets sit at all-time highs, with Chicago just 0.3 per cent below its peak.

Or is it THE fall? From the NY Times:

Is the Seller’s Market Over?

If the pandemic has been good to anybody, it’s been homeowners listing their properties, as pent-up demand for homes has sent prices skyrocketing. But could this sellers’ market finally be on the way out? Data suggests that may be the case.

A new report by Redfin examining more than 350 metropolitan areas nationwide shows that in the four weeks ending Sept. 5, half of homes sold went for over the asking price — down from a July peak of 55 percent. Homes aren’t moving as quickly, either: 47 percent sold during this period went into contract within two weeks, down from the March apex of 56 percent.

Bidding wars are worth keeping your eye on too, according to Redfin. The report shows that multiple bids on a property were less common nationwide in August than they were in the previous month and a year ago. Among Redfin brokers who submitted offers, 59 percent faced competition in August — 2021’s slowest month for bidding wars — down from a peak of 74 percent in April and 60 percent in August 2020.

Where is the trend most visible? When looking at 48 large metros in which Redfin brokers submitted at least 20 offers in both July and August of this year, multiple bids were at their lowest levels in Oklahoma City — 36 percent in August, down from 60 percent in July and a similar 60 percent a year earlier. Sarasota, Fla., and Richmond, Va., followed, as seen in this week’s chart.

What the serious f? From NJ Monthly:

Hackensack is Back on the Real-Estate Radar for Renters and Buyers

Forgive Hackensack for feeling overlooked. Torched by the British during the Revolution, the Bergen County seat never flexed the industrial muscle of Paterson, boasted the cultural richness of Newark, or enjoyed the cachet of Montclair. Instead, the city on its namesake river became known as a shopping destination. Its Main Street was the place to buy a dress or a suit. You could also catch a matinee at the Fox or the Oritani.

But the advent of malls—specifically, those in Paramus—spawned a decades-long decline of Hackenack’s urban core. The Franklin Simon and Arnold Constable department stores? Gone. The downtown movie theaters? Gone. The beloved Prozy’s Army-Navy store? A memory. Billy Joel didn’t help by singing, “Who needs a house out in Hackensack? Is that all you get for your money?”—lyrics that dissed a city gone dowdy.

Nowadays, Hackensack is feeling better about itself. A downtown revitalization in recent years has spawned a construction boom hitched to an eyebrow-raising nickname: the Sack.

Enticed by financial incentives from the city, developers are replacing underused or vacant commercial properties, even a parking lot, with luxury rental buildings replete with the amenities young professionals covet: gyms, swimming pools, grilling stations, pet spas, and rooftop decks with Manhattan views. The new buildings—some occupied, others under construction or yet to break ground—comprise more than 3,500 studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments, which could push the city’s population to 50,000 by 2024. (Currently at 43,856, Hackensack is New Jersey’s 20th most populous municipality.)

“For years, downtown Hackensack sat here, and nothing was happening,” says Bryan Hekemian, chairman of the Main Street Business Alliance, the public-private partnership that is central to the city’s redevelopment. “Well, now it’s Hackensack’s turn. Not just turn, but time.”

From Bloomberg:

New York City Has Once Again Defied the Doomsayers. Here’s Why.

New York City is emerging as one of the world’s most resilient big cities in the wake of the pandemic. The secret to its success is more than just its size — it’s the Big Apple’s model of urbanism that offers something no other American metropolis can match.

New York was the first big city in the country to be hit hard by Covid-19. Immediately, people began predicting that the pandemic would trigger a backlash against dense urban living. A wave of murder and violence that followed the mid-2020 Black Lives Matter protests  added weight to this glum forecast — the end of America’s urban revival was at hand. 

For some cities like San Francisco, the exodus does seem real — at least for now. But Gotham defied the doomsayers in spectacular fashion. An analysisof cell phone data showed that more people moved to the New York City metropolitan area during the pandemic than moved out. Young people are especially eager to move in.

In fact, recent data shows that the appeal of New York has been vastly understated over the past few years. Mid-decade U.S. Census estimates during the 2010s had shown the city’s population peaking and beginning to fall, but when the official 2020 Census numbers came in, it turned out that New York had actually been gaining population. So much for that mass exodus. 

How did New York City remain such a popular destination despite all its formidable challenges, and despite the fact that it isn’t in the booming Sun Belt? Economists’ go-to explanations are called agglomeration and industrial clustering effects:  basically, big cities tend to stay big, and rich cities tend to stay rich. New York is the home of many high-value industries, among them finance and publishing. Those industries keep a large, well-educated population of knowledge workers in the area, which draws in other companies — most recently, tech firms.

From Thomas Franklin at the Bergen Record: