Diminishing Middle Class in NYC

Diminishing Middle Class in NYC

If we look at the Lower Manhattan, it won't take us long to notice the change that has taken place in it in the last 10 years. The population especially the residential population has doubled up in the last 10 years as there has been an addition of 30,000 residents who are now living in Manhattan.

The main reason behind this sudden and huge growth in the population is the trend of construction that has taken place in Manhattan. This trend has led to the production of new as well as the conversion of the old buildings into new luxury housing. For this reason the living costs of the area have increased a lot and the previously affordable residential areas in the city have become some of the most expensive ones to live at. Also, the areas that used to be affordable to live in due to the protection that they provided also seem to be losing some of that protection. Even the rental units that are present in the neighborhood are some of the most expensive ones in the city.

Yes, the city has developed a lot and its infrastructure has improved a lot but at the same time we need to keep in mind the fact that due to all these developments it is becoming more and more difficult for the original residents of the city who helped in building this community to live there (MCB, 2011).

The buildings that are catering to the middle and lower income groups are mostly rentals with lotteries and waiting lists that are so long that there are hardly any people who are taken off of them. While we were researching this guide, we realized that our companies and organizations that carry out the process of tenant selection and eviction needs to be a lot more transparent. It's the management companies that are actually held responsible for providing the low and middle income tenants with the affordable housing with the help of the annual income certifications. However, the completion of these certificates depend on the actions that are taken by the oversight agency involved (MCB, 2011).

For the development outside the CB1 area some groups do benefit from the diversity of income. For example, it was once intended by the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) to allocate 20% of its housing to the tenants belonging to low income groups. However, today the only low income groups that are being supported by this agency are the ones that are located outside of BRC and the CB1 area with the help of the income that is being given by them to the New York City (NYC).

The funds that were allocated by the federal government towards the rebuilding and re-establishment of the Lower Manhattan after 9/11 are mainly benefitting affordability in the Lower East Side and the Chinatown (MCB, 2011).

Over View of New York Rental and Sales Market

Due to the low interest rate, increased foreign investment and the continued decline in the inventory the sales volume as well as the prices of the Manhattan real estate remained relatively steady throughout the second quarter of 2012 (Higgins, 2012).

According to a report from the StreetEasy.com, $840,000 was the median sale price for the second quarter which is approximately 2.4% more than what it was during the same period in 2011 (Higgins, 2012).

A relatively flat pricing is also being indicated by the city's largest brokerage firm, where one of them is showing the median dropping by 2.5% whereas, an increase of 1-2% is being shown by the other. According to Corcoran Group report, as compared to the previous year the sales volume is higher, in fact it has doubled since the first quarter of 2009 when the sales dropped to even less than 2,000 (Higgins, 2012).

According to James M. Gricar, who is the general sales manager at Halstead Property, "A lot of people have become confident again due to the stability of the prices in the past few quarters." He further says that, "Due to the high rental market and the low rates the condition are very good and all this has led to a very healthy, stable and optimistic market environment for the brokers." (Higgins, 2012)

According to the new numbers as well as the evidence that is being collected it seems like the national housing market has started to recover finally. However, according to Jonathan J. Miller who wrote Prudential Douglas Elliman's report and is also the president of the appraisal firm Miller Samuel said that, "It was the New York market that the national market was behind and the New York market started to stabilize early 2010 and is still moving sideways." He further says that it's the city that has benefitted the most from the foreign buyers as compared to the States housing market and that it was the tight co-op approval standards because of which the foreclosure rate in Manhattan remained low (Higgins, 2012).

It was the lower and the upper reaches of the market where the sale price was healthier. The sale price of an average condominium was high. This could also be noticed from the Brown Harris Stevens and Halstead Property that was showing an increase of 8 million as compared to the last year (Higgins, 2012).

It was noticed that the average price of the co-ops that were sold during the second quarter were slightly less than the same period in the last year. The main reason for this slight decline was the shift in the trend towards the entry-level apartments such as the studios and one-bedrooms. The drop that was shown in the Corcoran Report was of about 5% drop to $640,000. The market share of the studio and the one bedrooms has been above 50% for the third consecutive quarter, the reason behind this was the rising rents and the low mortgage rates (Higgins, 2012).

According to the StreetEasy.com a decrease of 5.9%, as compared to the same period in the last year was noticed, and it was noticed that the decline in the overall inventory was up to 14,254 apartments. In case that this trend continues it could result in rising demands which would ultimately increase the prices further. According to the StreetEasy.com as compared to the same period in the last year the number of price cuts was down to approximately 19.8% (Higgins, 2012).

It was reported by the StreetEasy.com that listings of more than 3400 went into contract in that quarter, this accounts for about 20.7% increase as compared to the previous year. According to the brokers, this increase was due to the low interest rates, increase in the demand, a continuous interest of the foreign investors in Manhattan as well as the limited inventory (Higgins, 2012).

According to Dottie Herman, who is the chief executive of Prudential Douglas Elliman, "This enthusiastic trend is expected to continue on to the early part of the summer (Higgins, 2012).

According to Hall F. Willkie who is the president of Brown Harris Stevens Residential Sales, "there are still some listings that are moving more quickly than the others. However, this increase in demand doesn't mean that the seller can ask for whatever price he wants." (Higgins, 2012).

Overview of Submarkets Rental and Sales

During the past quarter a drop in the prices was observed in most of the neighborhoods by the Manhattan New Development market. This decline was seen both regards to the price per square foot as well as sales price. The increase in the rental market can be made responsible for these decreases to a certain extent. Although, it is being said that the economy has started to recover once again but the people are still reluctant towards buying property as they believe that we are still in an "unknown territory." Therefore, many of the people feel safer in going for the rentals rather than buying.

Due to an increase of 37 units being sold the sales increase by 11% from those of the last year. In the light of this increase it can be seen that over a period of three months 379 units were sold. This makes the total amount of the new development sales to come up to 4 new sales each day. In Harlem the sales prices ranged around $200K whereas, the prices went as far up as $13 Million in Greenwich Village (MNDR, 2012).

If we look at the sales prices of the past year we notice that they dropped approximately 30%. In the third quarter of 2011 the amount of dropped sales was $1.5M whereas, in the past quarter the amount was $1,075,00. As compared to the last year quarter per square foot price has dropped from $1,243 to $1,062 which makes this decline about 15%. There was a drop in the price of only 2% on the basis of quarterly sales from $1,099,855 to $1,075,000. A decline of 9% was seen in the price per square foot as compared to the second quarter, which made the decline about $103 decline (MNDR, 2012).

Market upswings

The highest new development sale took place in the Greenwich Village during the past month. The property is located at 130 West 12th Street which made a sale of about $13M. There was another sale that took place on the 130 West 12th Street in the last quarter; this was a penthouse that was sold for $8,095,087. Another large development sale took place at the Upper West Side. A sale of $8,858,775 was made on a building that is situated at 535 West End Avenue. An interesting thing to note here is that all of these sales took place September. From among the 379 units that were sold about half of those units were sold for over a million dollars (MNDR, 2012).

The Sheffield located in Midtown West at the 322 West 57th Street made 20 new development sales that ranged from $700K to $3 Million. A large sale of $6.1 million was made at Trump Parc located at 160 Central park south. An increase of 8.5% was noted in the price per square foot by the Midtown West in this quarter for the new development sales. The per square foot median price increased up to $1,436 which is $113 more than the previous quarters (MNDR, 2012).

Market downswings

As mentioned by us in the last quarter that the Manhattan median price per foot has been on a decline for the last three quarters in a row, this declining trend has continued in this past quarter as well. The main reason behind this trend is more and more people renting and a lack of inventory.

As compared to the second quarter the price per foot is down to 9%. A decline of $103 was seen from $1,165 in second quarter and this further declined to $1,062 in the third quarter (MNDR, 2012).

A decline in per square foot price was reported by Murray Hill on a quarterly comparison. The decline was of about 7% that made the price come down to $98. It was in the second quarter that a bigger decline was reported in the sales of about 42% that made the prices come down to $783,200. The lack of inventory can be considered a reason for this decline in the numbers as there were only 5 new development sales by Murray Hill in the past quarter. East 29th Street was where all of these sales took place (MNDR, 2012).

Inventory Analysis

When an analysis of the data was done, it showed that the Upper East Side and the Upper West Side were where 18% of the sales came through. 10% of the contribution in sales was made by the Midtown West and the Midtown East. When the 17% of sales that took place in Harlem are added it makes the total sales for the quarter to be about 45%. There were 11 new sales that took place in Harlem as compared to the last quarter which made the sales come up to 66 for Harlem only (MNDR, 2012).

The rest of the 55% of sales were divided up in the ten other neighborhoods. In areas such as East Village, Gramercy Park and Murray Hill the reasons for the declining sales as well as the price per square foot is the lack of inventory.

Upper East Side

It can be seen from the data given above that the price per square foot for the studios located in the Upper East Side was $1,002, for bedrooms it was $821, for two bedrooms it was $1,355 whereas the price for the 1500+ square foot property was approximately $1,405.

When we talk about the percentage that was contributed by these properties in the overall sales in the Upper East Side, we see that studios account for 10.3% of sales, 1 bedroom apartments make up for 10.3% of the sales, 2 bedrooms for 51.3% of sales whereas, 1500+ square foot areas make up for 28.2% of the total sales.

Upper West Side

When we look at the prices at the Upper West Side, we notice that the price oer square foot for studios total up to around $1,031, for 1 bedrooms $1,012, for 2 bedrooms $1,371 whereas for the properties with more than 1500 square feet of place the price was $1,487.

Looking at the percentage of contributions made by the sales in the Upper West Side we see that the studios contributed for 22.6% of the sales, 1 bedrooms for 6.5%, 2 bedrooms for 21.2% and 1500+ square feet of place for 48.4% of the total sales.

Overview of Foreign Investment

Chinese Interest

A lot of buyers from China are buying the luxury properties across the U.S. This trend has been putting in billions of dollars in the real estate market of United States (Schuker, 2012).

In order to attract more and more of these Chinese buyers the real estate companies have started to install wok kitchens in their latest developments. Along with this these real estate agents have started to put up luck numbers on the choice units in accordance with the feng shui principles. The companies are sending their representatives to China in order to attract more and more customers. Other than this some of the real estate companies have started to package government programs along with their property sales to increase and attract more foreign investment (Schuker, 2012).

Most of the major buyers in the major U.S. cities such as New York, Los Angeles, and Miami are from China, Korea or Hong Kong. The number of these buyers has increased so much over the last few years that the landscape has started to change radically.

A Versailles-style mansion located at Sunset Boulevard in Beverly Hills, Calif was purchased by a Chinese couple last month for $34.5 million. A year before that $28 million was paid by a businessman for the purchase of a property nearby. One57 is a new Manhattan high-rise with many full-floor apartments each of approximately $50 million, in the past six months many of these apartments have been bought by Chinese buyer. This was reported by two separate people who are closely affiliated with the situation (Schuker, 2012).

In around to attract the Asian and particularly the Chinese buyers the luxurious full floor apartments have been very cleverly built by the on 80th to 88th floor. In this way the builders have very cleverly targeted the Chinese believe of 8 being the lucky number. Apartment on 88th which has the worth of about $50 million is currently under contractor of a Chinese buyer (Schuker, 2012).

From among the apartments located at the New York's 515 E. 72nd St. 15 apartments worth $1 million have been bought by Asians in the past six months. The new Ritz-Carlton Residences in downtown LA has half of the recent buyers from Asia; this project is developed by AEG. It has also been noticed that some of the buyers are buying in bulk as well, last year a businessmen from Shanghai, Fang Yi Liu, bought 17 apartments in the Artech which is a modern glass building that resembles a cruise ship and overlooks the Intracoastal Waterway near Miami, and the 17 apartments were bought for $14 million (Schuker, 2012).

European Interest

With the worsening situation of the euro debt, the affluent citizen from Britain, France and other European countries are flying to buy the real estate that at the moment is present the most stable conditions which is the Manhattan real estate (Li, 2012).

It is expected that the prices of the New York condos will be increases due to the limited number of them present on the island, due to this the international buyers can gain profits by selling their properties and saving themselves from the taxes that they have to pay while living in their home countries (Li, 2012).

Francois Hollande is a candidate of a French socialist party who at the moment has caused a great deal of worry for those living in Paris. According to Holland those who earn more than 1 million euros ($1.24 million) per year should pay tax rate of 75% including the capital gains. There are chances of additional breakdowns in the euro zone talk due to the difference in opinions of Hollande and the German chancellor Angela Merkel and all this could lead to even more delays in finding solutions to the problems (Li, 2012).

Last week in an interview with the CNBC, the vice chairman of Prudential Douglas Elliman and a top New York residential broker, Dolly Lenz said that the Europeans are coming to New York in droves due to the fact that they are worried about what is currently happening in France and what might happen after the elections. Therefore, he explained that the investments currently being done by the Europeans in the New York real estate is actually fright capital (Li, 2012).

According to Lenz the record low interest rates in the U.S. are not the main reason behind the investments that are being done by the foreigners in the U.S. market because usually the buyers pay in cash and the rest who want to be able to qualify for the mortgages usually have to pay a down payment of 40% (Li, 2012).

Since the last April when an American dollar was equal to 0.67 euros the dollar has increased up to being equal to 0.80 euros. Therefore, the factor of getting steep discounts can't be the reason for the Europeans to buy the property in U.S. However, the properties can be rented out while the Europeans aren't living in them (Li, 2012).

The flashy new development being carried out in the city such as Gary Barnett's One57 or the Joseph Moinian's W. New York downtown have been attracting a lot of Europeans. Proximity to the major landscape as well as the central park view also adds to the value of a property (Li, 2012).

A bill was introduced by Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Senators Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to further attract the foreigners into U.S. According to this bill any foreigner who invests at least $500,000 into the U.S. residential real estate will be awarded a three-year vise (Li, 2012).

It seems like the Europeans are ready to buy property in new York even if they are not planning on living in the country themselves (Li, 2012).

Development

The contributions being made in the new developments sales by the 3Q12 are in such a way that the studios are responsible for 19% of the sales, 1 bedrooms apartments are responsible for 21%, 2 bedrooms for 36%and 3 bedrooms for 25% of the total sales.

Nets Arena developments in the area and impact

Usually when a facility is built in a community the main reason behind it is either to retain the people who are already living in that community or to attract new areas. Whatever the reason behind the establishment of the new facility might be the major share of money is redirected from the already present local expenditures.

Same is the case with the proposed Nets arena in Brooklyn. The only major difference in the scenario mentioned above and the Nets arena in Brooklyn is that in the Nets arena the spending in the media market is usually reshuffled in the area, what is actually done is that the funds are relocated from one jurisdiction to another one.

Previously the taxes that used to go to New Jersey will now be to New York State and New York City (Zimbalist, 2004).

It is the New York State and the New York City where the incomes of the Nets players, staff and executive will be taxed. The spending that will be done at the nets games and other functions that will take place at the Atlantic Yards arena will be new to the New York State as well as the New York City, whereas, the sales taxes that will be collected from all of this spending will be sent to the public coffers (Zimbalist, 2004).

The question that arises now is not regarding the possibility of getting the tax revenues or not but rather how large the revenues will be.

In order to make a reasonable estimate the amount of revenues that will be collected it is essential to make some assumptions. As, the approximate date for the completion of the Atlantic Yards arena is before the 2007-2008 season, which means that it will be available for the season. Keeping in mind the current payroll of the team and an increase of about 5% in the salaries, the estimated payroll come up to be $65.5 million for 2007-2008.

I will be going for the assumption that about 30% of these players will be living in the five boroughs. Therefore, these players will be paying the New York City as well as the New York State. However, the rest of the 70% of players will pay the tax only to the New York State. Keeping the high level of income being earned by the players I would estimate the income tax rate to be approximately 6.46% for New York State whereas, for the New York City it will be 4.04% (Zimbalist, 2004).

It was the projection done by or for FCRC from which most of the ticket prices, Nets attendance and the construction costs have been taken from. After having a discussion with the FCRC I found these rates to be very reasonable. According to the FCRC there will be a total of 224 events that will be hosted during the year and that there will be no hosting of the NHLs team done by them, all this has been estimated by keeping in mind the assumption that there will be no new arena in Newark, the CAA will be closed eventually, no minor league hockey events will be played at the Atlantic Yards arena and there will be no NHL. Three scenarios have been laid out by the FCRC projects, these scenarios are based on the aggressive, conservative and moderate assumptions. The estimates that I have made use of are from their moderate scenario (Zimbalist, 2004).

The players pay their taxes based on 75% of their salaries. This is due to the reason that they only spend 75% of their time during an active season, whether they are playing or practicing, in the New York State. For this reason they only pay tax on 75% of their salary and the rest of the 25% they pay in the other states where they play. Based on this principle the other players that visit the New York State to play games should also pay tax on the income that they make while staying in NY. Therefore, 25% of the average salary of NBA players for 2007-2008 was taken by me to make an estimate of the taxes that should be paid by the team players that visit New York for their games (Zimbalist, 2004).