Question for Noah Urban Digs as inventory approaches 10,000

Try this;
http://coregroupnyc.com/files//reports/CORE_Real_Time_Report_FEB.pdf

Thanks for posting, jake, as I'm also baffled.

Would also love to hear Noah's take on this report.

One factor is that a much larger than usual number of people are changing brokers after the initial listing agreement expires. There is almost always a couple of days between the two events, increasing the number of units "removed" from the market. Whether that explains the difference, not sure.

jake, I may be wrong (and I'll obv let Noah answer this definitively), but I believe the contracts data is pretty lagging, so the numbers won't tie out.

here is the answer that I discussed when I lauched that widget:

PRICE CUTS / NEW LISTINGS / CONTRACTS signed on that front page widget are aggregate totals for the 1DAY, 7DAY, 30DAY - meaning there were a total of 1,963 new listings added in past 30 days, and 37 added today.

The TOTAL INVENTORY # is AVERAGED for that widget. If I added it up like I did the other 3 variables, 30 DAY INVENTORY would show up as 2,700,000 units. Basically the total inventory resets DAILY, by a new DATA PULL from streeteasy at around 8AM which follows their wee hour web sweep and db update. That # is logged for use in charts and is averaged for the 7DAY, 30DAY number on the widget. Sometimes its not just as easy as adding in the new listings total for the day. What about listings temp taken off market, or other ways of removing a previously active listing?

Make sense? We felt this was the best way to do it. If you disagree,

oops, meant 270,000 units if I added up total inventory for the 30 day snapshot

if you disagree, let me know thoughts. Charts will be updated on the site soon!

I don't see much inventory increase for 1.5-2million range in the Downtown area?Also,not much reduction in price for the ones that have been listed since November.Seems like many are either pulling them off or waiting fo rthings to get better with the market.What are our thoughts?

UD, here's the thing that doesn't quite add up. You can actually search on new listings in manhattan for the past 30 days. I did so and there are 1,866 new listings listed. I checked a bunch of them and while some are definitely re-listings of things that were on the market before, they were all still new listings on streeteasy. Your cumulative (new listings) vs. average (inventory) explanation doesn't work. The formula is:
30 day ago inventory + 30 days cumulative listings - 30 day contracts signed - 30 day cumulative de-listings = current inventory.

Basically if 30 days ago, inventory was at 9,517 and you have cumulatively over past 30 days 1,963 listings and 334 contracts signed then it must be that 1,174 listings were taken off the market. Now the 1,963 doesn't quite match up with the 1,866 and that may be because of the difference between adding 30 days of data and getting the aggregate 30 days at once... but still, shouldn't make that big of a difference.

jake, i think that the 1200 or so can only be explained by listings taken off the market and what aboutready mentioned as listings with new brokers. could also be that contract signed lag a bit, but that lag should be pretty consistent over time and we all know not THAT many apartments are selling now.

but the 30day inventory widget AVERAGE of 9517 shown on front of UD may NOT be what the actual TOTAL INVENTORY logged in at 30 days ago, for that day.

Maybe the total inventory 30 days ago came in at 9,250, and it was only in the last 2 weeks that new listings popped leading to the 30 day average of 9517?

I know a few of the listings I am keeping my eye on have been taken off the market. But 1,200 seems like too many. That seems like an astonishingly large number of sellers changing their minds. Or perhaps hoping they can get their price when things get better in the spring. I know some sellers took listings off the market in the fall thinking that the holidays were going to be down time and that things would be better after (pick one) bonus season/obama inauguration/super bowl/ school acceptances/groundhog day/viernal equinox/Chinese new year/reporting day for pitchers and catchers/ spring break/.....

i have about 30 listings or so saved. and about 4 or them have been taken off the market in the past couple few weeks. i know its a small sample size, but if 1200/9500=13% of listings are taken off or listed with a new broker, it would be roughly consistent with what i've seen. anyways, if you look on streeteasy right now, there are about

We found 9,953 listings with an address
Median price: $1,195,000 Median size: 1,142 ft² Median price per ft²: $1,111

This number is very close to the number you had for today. In fact, and difference can probably be explained by intraday moves.

UD,

Your total inventory chart looks like it has the actual data point not the 30 day average so you must have the real number. As I look at the chart, you are correct it is definitely not 9,517 and 9,250 looks about right. Still that would suggest 950 listings taken off the market. One take away is that there are counter trends working against inventory moving above 10,000. Yet here we are. And it looks like this will be the week we cross over. And contracts signed have flatlined around 10-12 per day.

UD, on a slightly different note, what do you think the total true amount of inventory is out there? We have 10,000 on streeteasy. Then we need to add new build condos that haven't released inventory (even those buildings that post on streeteasy don't always have all their available inventory on the site) and small brokered apartments that don't use streeteasy and then all FSBO. the reason i ask is i actually looked at a sample sheet of closed apartments in therealdeal.com and about 20-30% of them didn't even have a listing at all in streeteasy! Could the number be as high as 12-13,000 when all is said and done?

absolutely. Thats the 64K question. We need more transparency if possible!