If you’re waiting until spring to splurge on your own little piece of the Big Apple pie, think twice. The real estate pros we spoke with all said that fall is a great time to buy a home in NYC: “Number one, because there’s less competition,” says Julia Joseph Romero, Licensed Real Estate Salesperson for Cantor & Pecorella, Inc and a StreetEasy Expert. “Most buyers wait until spring so they can move in before the school year starts.” But that’s not the only reason to fall for house-hunting this season. Here, all the reasons why fall is a great time to buy a home in NYC.
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1. Moving Is Cheaper
New Yorkers love a deal, as the proliferation of cheap-yet-delicious pizza joints in NYC can attest. And if you wait until fall to buy and move into your new place, you just might score a discounted moving rate.
“Roughly 70% of all moves traditionally happen from Memorial Day to Labor Day,” says Najah Ayoub, CMO of New York’s Piece of Cake Moving & Storage. “While you might want to avoid moving in fall and winter, these months typically provide the cheapest options in terms of both moving costs and rental charges.”
Translation: more money in the budget to decorate your new pad, which might be reason enough that fall is a great time to buy a home in NYC.
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2. The Weather Tends to be Gourgeous
You don’t have to schlep all the way to New England for a Gilmore Girls-worthy autumn experience, because pumpkin spice season does New York right. The leafy tree canopies of our many parks become quilts of oranges and reds, and coffee shops aplenty await with cozy cuppas. In short, it’s sweater season: a great time to buy a home in NYC.
If you don’t hire movers (and even if you do), “It’s easier to move in the fall,” Romero says. “Because it’s a little more crisp — and hopefully there’s no snow — you’re not sweating like you are in the summer. It’s a more pleasant time to move.”
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3. Fewer Buyers, Fewer Headaches
Yeah, early birds get worms — but sometimes, the late birds get worms, too. Bigger, more delectable ones…with less effort! “Competition among buyers usually tends to heat up in spring,” says Kenny Lee, economist at StreetEasy. “That’s really related to buyers returning to the market following the holidays in the previous year. Generally, as the weather in the city gets warmer, March is usually the most competitive time to buy.”
So as you might expect, autumn counterbalances all that real estate nuttiness. “Early fall is still a busy time for sellers who missed the spring home shopping season,” Lee says. “I think many sellers as well as buyers rejoined the market after summer travels. Compared to spring, there just aren’t as many home shoppers in the market for that reason.”
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Romero agrees that fewer people are considering a real estate purchase this time of year, making fall a great time to buy a home in NYC. “Spring is nice and warm — the weather starts getting better, so people like to go out and look at homes then,” she says. “So in fall, you have less buyers to compete with, and that sort of gives you a little bit more bargaining power. There are still buyers out there, but I think there’s less serious buyers. So if you’re someone who is serious about your home search and would be ready to put in an offer, then I think fall is a great time to get out there.”
4. Discounts Abound
The number of days that a listed home sits languishing on the market tends to rise in the fall. “Generally, it takes a longer time to sell homes listed between October and December,” says Lee.
Loosely translated? You can score deals because homeowners are getting antsy in the pantsy — or, what realtors might describe as highly motivated.
“That means buyers are more likely to find slight discounts on homes that are still on the market in the fall,” Lee says. “It’s probably related to sellers who couldn’t take advantage of the spring home shopping season. As the listings stay on the market for longer, sellers are likely feeling more pressure to lower the price slightly, to really indicate that they are willing to negotiate on the price so that they can get their home sold.”
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Romero, in the trenches as a real estate agent, concurs. “Pricing is a bit more competitive and negotiable in the fall,” she says. “Sellers are typically a little bit more motivated to sell this time of year — especially if they’re a seller who listed [the home] in spring or summer. When fall comes around, they’re probably thinking, ‘I’d like to sell this before the end of the year.’ So maybe they would consider price drops, or negotiating a bit more…it’s not always the case, but if you go and look at the listings right now on StreetEasy, there’s a lot of stuff still on the market that was listed back in May or June. If you’re a buyer, those prices could come down a little bit.”
Say it with us: cha, ching!
5. Fall Foliage…or Lack Thereof
Few real estate photographers look for bare-naked trees out windows to highlight in a listing, but the fact is, that’s how the trees out your windows will look for a significant chunk of the year in this climate. That’s just one more reason fall is a great time to buy a home in NYC: the season offers a good reality check for buyers.
“You can really get a sense of what the view from your apartment is going to look like most of the year, because cold weather lasts in New York for a long time,” Romero says. “Spring and summer are great to see green trees, but a lot of the year the trees don’t have any leaves. So if you want to get a true view, fall’s a great time. Go look and see what your view is going to look like for eight months out of the year!”
If you still love the way it looks without the blissful, leafy filter of spring and summer, you’re more likely to be sold on the place all year round.
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