Bottom's up: Building sales soar in first half

We are bullish on the market,” said Paul Massey, chief executive of Massey Knakal. “We are seeing people listing and people bidding aggressively on properties.”

forgot this..

Er...even the dutch and indians had more transaction volume than 2009.....come on dude, the same retread information wearing a different dress.
Building sales instead of apartments sales.

The real story is, volume HAS RETURNED TO NORMAL, which is a good thing.
Prices is a different story.

I can't believe this is a Crain's article.
Using language like "value of building sales doubled" to confuse sum total of sales with price per.

It makes think of that movie about the Chicago black sox. The catcher so frustrated as if half his team being "bought" wasn't bad enough,the ump making a ridiculous call and the catcher yelling out..."And who's paying you?!"

So Amanda Fung at Crains, who is paying you?

earth to truthskr: volume nearly always picks up at the bottom of bear markets

Article is not that necessarily bullish. Speaks more to volume and I believe more about commercial activity. Remember NYC is an important world city that investors all over he world will consider and now we potentially have Chinese Multinationals looking to set up shop.

People should not give up on NY.

Which Chinese multinational is relocating to NYC?

Approximately how many jobs and ballpark square feet that you anticipate they will need?

So...how about them Chinese multinationals? Anynword yet?

riversider
"Article is not that necessarily bullish"

Yes but it is dressed up to appear so. And indeed it is commercial, but remember the heart and soul of Massey Knackel are those 10 to 40 unit residential apartment buildings with or without ground floor commercial.
They definitely need some transaction action.

I imagine the last collaborated effort by MK and Fung did not bode well for business....;)
http://streeteasy.com/nyc/talk/discussion/20017-crains-sales-defy-expectations-go-nowhere

"Despite the huge jump for the half, the dollar volume was still down 82% from the peak of the market in the first half of 2007. "

82%?!

How are the commercial brokers going to feed their families?

Seriously, a 91% drop in volume implies a business essentially going to zero. I don't care that the business was at a much lower base several years prior. People build up overheads and fixed costs as their busniess grows. Not to the same extent as the growth, but the fixed costs are still harder to eliminate once added. People buy bigger apartments, Hamptons homes, investor apartments. Businesses take out bigger or more expensive leases, hire more staff, lease more expensive cars, get more expensive health insurance.

Doubling your revenue off a loss of 91% might hardly make a dent in that.

Poor, poor steveF, he conveniently "missed" the conclusion from the SAME SOURCE that noted the outlook is BAD!

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20100713/REAL_ESTATE/100719961

"Real estate advisory firm finds that rise leasing activity is due to companies seeking smaller, more reasonably priced office space."

"The effects of recession, along with the lack of recovery in the key industries, have pushed more and more landlords into financial distress and made them more willing to offer incentives to prospective tenants. As a result, rents have dropped by as much as 40%, in some cases more, according to the report. In addition, landlords are more willing to offer incentives on pre-built spaces under 8,000 square feet."

WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPS!

poor, poor steveF

"Despite the huge jump for the half, the dollar volume was still down 82% from the peak of the market in the first half of 2007. "

Oh my lord. Can SteveF not read more than two sentences into an article? Or is he just closing his eyes?

Well that's the silliness of the metric that was chosen...."dollar volume" gets double jeopardy in either direction.

Average closings in manhattan for coops/condos are @2200 per quarter.
Just to give an idea on the data for this stellar article, these are the numbers that were for individual condo/coops in manhattan, the same time period.

Q2 2009 you had 1532 avg price per sq ft $1139.
Q2 2007 you had 3939 avg price per sq ft $1056.
Q2 2010 you had 2756 avg price per sq ft $1051.

So let's even say price per sq foot remains constant, what does "dollar volume" look like when you compare Q2 2007 3939 closings (lets pick an easy round median number of 1 mil for a total $3,939,000,000 ) to Q2 2009 ($1,532,000,000) That's a sensational headline "DOWN 61%."
..... or compare Q2 2009 to Q2 2010 (2,756,000,000) That's UP a sensational headline "NEARLY DOUBLE!"

YOY gets silly enough, going on a metric like "dollar volume" is Full Retard.

And to go even further in Commercial where the sale of or bankruptcy of 4 buildings in a quarter can render your dat useless.
You have to look at commercial with the same old boring metrics as residential.....number of sales, square feet, price per square foot.

edited paragraph for proper detail

So let's even say price per sq foot remains constant, what does "dollar volume" look like when you compare Q2 2007 3939 closings (lets pick an easy round median number of 1 mil per sale for a total $3,939,000,000 "dollar volume" ) to Q2 2009 ($1,532,000,000 "dollar volume") That's a sensational headline "DOWN 61% dollar volume."
..... or compare Q2 2009 to Q2 2010 (2,756,000,000 "dollar volume") That's UP a sensational headline "NEARLY DOUBLE dollar volume!"