seems like 5000 is the new 7000

ooops, this also applies to the DOW

Any bets on which will recover first?

DJIA first, bc there is less emotion attached to dumping all you stocks... whereas, 6% brokerage, pay off loans, look for comps, bankruptcy process, LL setting fires to their homes... all take effort and makes the NYC RE market sticky... and not in a cinnabun sticky good way :)

IMHO, NY can't recover until the finance industry does. It generated too much of the cities revenue, not only through corporate taxes, but income taxes and the ancillary businesses (lawyers, printers, restaurants, retail etc) Apologies to Mayor Bloomberg but given NYC's onerous tax structure, the city will not be a magnet for start-ups.

Oops, make that "city's" revenue. I should have added that a lot of WS'ers bought property subject to the mansion tax as well.

the economy is crashing yet prices have come down but nothing compared to the stock market...any hope that real estate prices will keep falling to '03 prices..

RE is sticky each single correction. the stock mkt is the opposite, with tons of forced selling and short covering. it doesn't mean that RE will not overshoot on the downside, but it takes years to achieve a drop that the stock mkt achieves in months.

W67 -- It surprises me that rents aren't falling faster at bigger rental buildings like Archstone, Related, etc given the reasons you stated. You would think the big REITs would be less emotional and take their losses. especially in terms of free rent. That's like a one-time charge that would at least improve cash flow 30-60 days down the road. I'm surprised how much resistance I meet.

iceman, wait until summer/early fall. that's the season when alot of leases turn over, people in, people out. Hell, half of the new attorneys this year, it seems, are being told to stay home for 4 months to a year. That's just one example. I can't imagine we'll have the regular influx of anybody, and I can imagine that a fair number of people might consider lease end a good time to say goodbye to a rotten apple, so to speak.

The apartments I listed above are all on 100 - 130 days. Naturally, when I called the brokers all said the same basic thing.... "we are negotiating with another couple, if I can get you in fast blah blah blah". Funny, how activity suddenly picked up.

2003 levels? try 96 levels.

I'll be happy when 5 is the new 9.
ice - we saw W 89th St about a month ago. They plan to "renovate" (i.e. paint, new counters, etc). May be worth $4500 when all is said and done. maybe.... it was rough, but space was decent. There's a description somewhere in SE land.