The Amazon hype has spread across the East River, but so far, only Long Island City home prices are spiking. (amriphoto / Getty Images)

Immediately after the announcement of Amazon’s plans to build a major new campus in Long Island City, home prices in the neighborhood stopped falling and began to climb. In the five weeks after Nov. 5, when the Amazon HQ2 plans leaked, 35 listings in Long Island City, or 18.8 percent of the total number of homes for sale there, increased their price.

Prior to the announcement, the Long Island City sales market, like that of the city at large this year, had struggled. In October, inventory was up 62 percent from the same month in 2017, and 13 percent of area sellers slashed prices on their listings. In the five weeks prior to the Amazon announcement, not a single listing in Long Island City had raised its price.

Then came the Amazon news — first as a leak, and then, on Nov. 13, as an official announcement. Along with a sizeable batch of price increases in Long Island City, there was a notable decline in price cuts as well: Only five of them (affecting 2.7 percent of the total market) occurred in the five weeks after Nov. 5, compared to 37 price cuts in the weeks leading up to the announcement.

It will be months, if not years, before data shows the full impact of Amazon’s plans on the housing market, and rents in the area likely won’t reflect the new campus until its workers start to arrive. But these latest numbers confirm some of the speculative interest seen in the first days after Amazon’s plans became public. Tales swirled in the press of minivans full of buyers shuttling between open houses, and investors sealing deals via text message. The days following the official announcement saw a 519 percent surge in interest in Long Island City among StreetEasy users.

Yet despite the excitement among NYC landlords and sellers about Amazon’s plans, the current price increases are largely confined to Long Island City. In Astoria, sellers hiked prices on 10 listings (4 percent of inventory) in the five weeks following the Amazon leak — but 25 listings saw their prices slashed over the same period. No other neighborhood has seen such a dramatic reversal in its price trend as Long Island City, and some nearby neighborhoods haven’t seen much change at all.

Amazon HQ2 Hype Extends Well Beyond Queens

The lack of price movement outside of Long Island City has not stopped sellers and agents across the city from touting the Amazon announcement in listing descriptions. While only three current listings in the Long Island City area celebrate the incoming Amazon campus, listing descriptions for another 75 units for sale in 48 buildings across Manhattan, Queens, and Brooklyn are reminding home shoppers of the news.

Nowhere is this more prevalent than in Midtown East, where 42 units in 15 buildings advertise their proximity to the future Amazon site across the East River. Language in listings includes optimistic reminders — “10 minutes away from Long Island City, where Amazon HQ will be coming soon” — and even all-caps hard sells that might make a used-car salesman blush: 

BUY AT THE LOW WITH OBVIOUS APPRECIATION DUE TO ITS VISUAL PROXIMITY TO AMAZON HQ2!! Sara Palin saw Russia from her window and you can see across the river to Amazon from this apartment. Amazon executives will be seeking such luxury apartments!

The trend of Manhattan listings touting their proximity to Queens illustrates just how upside down the New York City real estate market has become going into 2019. With Manhattan prices down 2.5 percent from the prior year as of October, and Queens prices up 5.4 percent, developers are pinning their hopes on Amazon.

But these hopes ignore that fact that Manhattan condo prices are slipping at a time when New York City is already deep into an economic expansion. The opening of Hudson Yards, the development of One Vanderbilt, and news of a massive expansion by JP Morgan Chase at 270 Park Avenue have all thus far failed to keep condo in Midtown East from falling. Time will tell whether Amazon’s arrival yields a different result.
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