The housing market in White Plains has taken a drubbing since the stock market crash of 2008. Although some adjacent areas are showing small signs of stabilization, the same can not be said for the city of White Plains. This is ironic because White Plains was at the epicenter of the housing boom for Westchester County.
White Plains NY Cooperatives:
Cooperative prices were actually up slightly over the same period in 2008. However, this slight uptick might be do to an increase in the proportion of 2 BR units in the sales statistics. The previous quarter showed a grim 17% price reduction and recent sales in specific complexes indicates that this downward trend is continuing. Since 2 BR units are suddenly far more affordable, buyers are finding that they can afford a larger unit. Sales volume is down 17% over the previous year and the current inventory of 9 months indicates a buyer’s market undergoing a price correction bordering on double digits.
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This is a story about selling your home during a housing recession.
Sellers with homes listed today will be able to identify with some of the antics that buyers in a bear market will pull. But this is about a listing that was active 14 years ago in 1996 – during another deep housing recession. I wasn’t a real estate agent at the time, I was a seller. My mother had just died after a prolonged illness and I was listing her house for sale. The house in question was a beautiful 1932 Tudor sitting on prime property with sweeping golf course views in wonderful residential area in White Plains. There was a good deal of emotion involved since the home in question had been designed by my Grandmother and built by my Grandfather.
Although I wasn’t an agent I was smart enough to read the newspapers and so I know it was a crummy market. The house would have been worth roughly $600k just a few short years ago – but in 1996-1997 I was hoping for about $550k – but knew I would probably only see a litte more than $500k. Gut instinct told me to rent the place, but my co-executor was adamant that the house had to be sold.
Nothing prepared me for the crazy home buyers that came through looking for a “deal.”
90% of them were bottom-feeders looking to steal a house – and looking for ANY excuse to chisel the price to the bone. My beleaguered broker came to me with all sorts of concession requests – some of which made sense. But more often than not, the requests bordered on the absurd. Some of the more hilarious issues are worth noting because when we see frustrated sellers – we need to be aware that their pain is real and that some of the crazy concessions being asked by buyers can be truly ridiculous.
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The housing market in White Plains has taken a drubbing since the stock market crash of 2008. Although some adjacent areas are showing small signs of stabilization, the same can not be said for the city of White Plains. This is ironic because White Plains was at the epicenter of the housing boom for Westchester County.
