Andra Rus Queens: median sale price is back to levels seen before 2008
Residential Market Highlights
- The median Queens home sales price hits an 8-year high: $360,000.
- The total number of transactions was 11,500 (-5% Y-o-Y).
- The luxury market record for number of sales was broken: 323 sales recorded over $1M.
- The most expensive neighborhood: Forest Hills Gardens with a median home sale price of $1.25 million.
- The neighborhood with biggest median home price increase Y-o-Y: Rockaway Park at 64%.
- Most expensive property sold: $3.7M for a single-family home in Malba.
- Most expensive condo: $2.2M for a unit in Hunters Point.
Steady growth for the real estate market
The real estate market in Queens has been steadily growing for the past 5 years and is now back to the values recorded before the market fell. The growth is rather slow and the number of Queens sales recorded in 2015 is still considerably lower than the numbers recorded before 2008, but these could still be signs of a healthy recovery.
Here’s the evolution of median sale prices and sales volumes since 2007:
Luxury market breaks records
With all the attention given to Queens in the past years, and growing interest from buyers that have been priced out of Brooklyn, homes for sale in Queens have been in high demand, the luxury market reaching an all-time-high. The number of homes sold for over $1M in Queens was 323 in 2015, which is more than double the number recorded in 2011 when only 135 properties sold in this range.
Queens’s neighborhoods: a mix of luxury and affordability
In 2015, there was a huge variation across individual neighborhoods in Queens with median sale prices covering a wide range.
Forest Hills Gardens was the most expensive neighborhood in Queens, its median sale price reaching $1,250,000. At this value, it ranked as the 15th most expensive neighborhood in NYC; Dumbo in Brooklyn was the only neighborhood outside Manhattan that ranked higher:
At the other end of the spectrum, a good number of Queens neighborhoods were well below the borough’s median. Here are the ones with the lowest median sale prices in 2015: Holliswood ($137,000), Jamaica Hills ($141,065) or Lindenwood ($155,000)
As far as Y-o-Y variations in median sale prices go, Rockaway Park saw the biggest increase in median sale price, 64%, from $252,500 in 2014 to $415,000 in 2015. Whitestone, on the other hand, recorded the biggest Y-o-Y decrease, from $480,825 in 2014 to $328,500 in 2015 (-32%).
Most expensive properties
The title of most expensive home sold in Queens in 2015 goes to the single-family property at 6 Boulevard in Malba which closed for $3,700,000, while the most expensive condo sale was recorded in The View at EastCoast building in Hunters Point. Unit 1001 sold for $2,200,000 in September 2015.
Top 10 most expensive single family home sales in Queens
In terms of single-family homes, 3 properties crossed the $3M mark in 2015 and homes in Malba and Forest Hills Gardens dominate the top 10:
| # | Address | Sale price | Sale date | Neighborhood |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 Boulevard | $3,700,000 | July 15, 2015 | Malba |
| 2 | 126 Beach 135 Street | $3,075,000 | September 21, 2015 | Belle Harbor |
| 3 | 3110 28 Road | $3,000,000 | March 20, 2015 | South Astoria |
| 4 | 122 Malba Drive | $2,900,000 | July 24, 2015 | Malba |
| 5 | 11002 68 Drive | $2,860,000 | March 6, 2015 | Forest Hills |
| 6 | 56 Groton Street | $2,700,000 | July 31, 2015 | Forest Hills Gardens |
| 7 | 30 Markwood Place | $2,600,000 | April 10, 2015 | Forest Hills Gardens |
| 8 | 7166 Parsons Boulevard | $2,550,000 | October 9, 2015 | Kew Gardens Hills |
| 9 | 44 Seasongood Road | $2,325,000 | September 17, 2015 | Forest Hills Gardens |
| 10 | 5 Point Crescent | $2,250,000 | August 31, 2015 | Malba |
Top 10 most expensive apartment sales in Queens
Condos in Hunters Point dominated the top 10 apartment sales together with apartments from Forest Hills:
| # | Address | Sale price | Sale date | Neighborhood |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4630 Center Boulevard #1001 | $2,200,000 | September 10, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 2 | 2728 Thomson Avenue #717 | $2,150,000 | May 28, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 3 | 541 47 Road #1A | $2,138,325 | July 9, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 4 | 108-20 71St Avenue #PH1C | $1,995,770 | June 29, 2015 | Forest Hills |
| 5 | 5009 2 Street #1114 | $1,988,000 | November 17, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 6 | 1102 49 Avenue #10A | $1,820,000 | April 30, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 7 | 541 47 Road #2A | $1,802,303 | February 15, 2015 | Hunters Point |
| 8 | 10724 71 Road #18B | $1,800,000 | August 20, 2015 | Forest Hills |
| 9 | 108-20 71 St Avenue #PH2C | $1,725,934 | July 6, 2015 | Forest Hills |
| 10 | 108-20 71St Avenue #PH1B | $1,664,839 | June 23, 2015 | Forest Hills |
Check out our report on Brooklyn’ real estate market in 2015 and compare it to Queens!
Methodology:
* 2015 sales data is based only on residential properties sold between January 1, 2005 and December 15, 2015
* The building classes counted are single family homes, condo and coop units
* The final number of properties sold in 2015 was adjusted
*Luxury sales were considered all properties priced over $1 million
