Eliza Theiss Key Takeaways:
- New York City median sale price and sales activity stay nearly flat, Brooklyn defies trend with 12% median sale price increase
- Hudson Yards remains NYC’s most expensive neighborhood at $7.5M, followed by SoHo & TriBeCa
- Chinatown returns to top 10 with $2M median sale price after two-year absence
- 257% Fieldston pricing surge brings the Bronx back for second historic appearance
- Little Neck in Queens experiences 190% price jump, stops just shy of $1M median sale price
- Gowanus logs most notable price drop at 44%, median price falls $1M Y-o-Y
- Brooklyn provides two sharpest sales increases with Greenpoint & Greenwood Heights, as well as most significant slowdown in sales with Boerum Hill & Carroll Gardens
- 35 neighborhoods post medians of at least $1M — two fewer than one year ago
At first glance, the New York City real estate market seems to have stayed flat compared to year-ago conditions: NYC’s median sale price ticked up a mere 2% year-over-year (Y-o-Y), while sales shifted down a near-negligible 1%. Even at the borough level, price and sales trends were similarly muted in the Bronx, Manhattan and Queens, while Brooklyn alone went against the grain with both prices and sales on the rise.
But, zooming in to the neighborhood level, significant shifts occurred: Most notably, the Bronx marked its second-ever appearance among the city’s 50 most expensive neighborhoods, and Chinatown reappeared among the city’s 10 most expensive neighborhoods after a two-year absence.
The Bronx Returns to NYC’s 50 Most Exclusive Neighborhoods for 1st Time Since Early 2023 Debut
The 52 neighborhoods that comprised our top 50 (the result of two pricing ties) were comprised of 21 Manhattan and 21 Brooklyn neighborhoods that were joined by nine Queens locations and one Bronx neighborhood. Of NYC’s 50 richest neighborhoods, 13 neighborhoods saw prices contract by at least 10%, with Gowanus undergoing the most severe price cut at -44% Y-o-Y.
Conversely, 21 neighborhoods marked median sale price increases of 10% or more, topping out with Fieldstone’s staggering 257% Y-o-Y price surge. Notably, that surge ranked a Bronx neighborhood among the city’s 50 most expensive for only the second time ever after Fieldstone’s first appearance in Q1 2023. That said, Fieldstone dropped off for the rest of 2023 (for example, it was #135 in Q2 2023).
Similar to its first appearance, Fieldstone’s return was fueled by a change in its more customary property mix: 64% of the neighborhood’s second-quarter sales this year were single family homes, as opposed to just 17% during the same period last year. In fact, nearly half of the neighborhood’s sales were single family homes that changed hands for more than $1 million.
This shift propelled the Bronx enclave’s median sale price from the year-ago $252,000 to $900,000 during the course of the last three months — $60,000 higher than its debut median last year and well above the borough’s current $343,000 median sale price.
Explore the interactive map below for at-a-glance price and sales insights for NYC’s neighborhoods in Q2 2024:
Chinatown Back Among NYC’s 10 Priciest Neighborhoods After 4-Year Absence
The city’s top 10 most expensive neighborhoods were represented by a familiar mix of eight Manhattan and two Brooklyn neighborhoods, most of which recorded only a handful of sales. Specifically, six of NYC’s 10 richest neighborhoods had fewer than 20 sales.
As has been the case for nearly five years now, Hudson Yards was the #1 most expensive NYC neighborhood at a median sale price of $7.5 million, which was nearly one-third higher than its year-ago $5.75 million. Yet, sales were down 62% Y-o-Y, marking one of the most drastic sales drops among the city’s priciest neighborhoods.
SoHo and TriBeCa were next, completing the familiar leading trio of expensive NYC neighborhoods, even though their combined median sale prices would still be surpassed by Hudson Yards. At a median sale price of $3.1 million, SoHo was the #2 most expensive NYC neighborhood, despite a 13% decline, while TriBeCa was #3 at $2.9M. And, although TriBeCa’s pricing was nearly the same as it was one year ago, sales slowed 15%.
Prices also slid (-7% Y-o-Y) in Hudson Square, and the city’s #4 priciest neighborhood closed Q2 at a $2.46 median. It’s worth noting here that the second quarter of last year was the same configuration of the top four priciest neighborhoods.
At #5 stood Little Italy with a median sale price of $2.4 million after a 50% Y-o-Y jump and a 44% increase in sales activity. Little Italy’s price jump was fueled by a change in the types of properties sold. Specifically, condos accounted for all 13 sales that took place here in the second quarter of the year, but made up just 67% of sales one year ago. Additionally, only one Little Italy condo was sold for less than $1 million in Q2 2024, as opposed to claiming one-third of sales in Q2 2023.
Coming in at #6, Chinatown returned among the 10 most expensive NYC neighborhoods for the first time in two years thanks to a 79% Y-o-Y price jump that pushed its median sale price up to $2.03 million. This was the result of a significant 34% increase in the average size of units sold from the year-ago 970-square-foot average to 1,300 square feet in the second quarter of this year.
Cobble Hill (#7) and Carroll Gardens (#8) were next at $1.96 million and $1.95 million, respectively. The two neighborhoods stood out not only as Brooklyn’s most expensive, but also due to significant slowdowns in sales activity.
In particular, Carroll Gardens’ 63% Y-o-Y drop in sales was the second-most drastic slowdown in sales among the city’s most exclusive neighborhoods, while Cobble Hill’s 48% Y-o-Y was the fourth-sharpest. Both neighborhoods also saw prices rise with Carroll Gardens’ 75% Y-o-Y jump the fourth-highest price increase. This was the result of higher-priced ($1 million and above) sales making up a larger share of the neighborhoods sales total in Q2 2024
Meanwhile, with prices flat year-over-year at $1,725,000, the Flatiron District ranked as the city’s #9 priciest, followed by the West Village at #10 with a $1,655,000 median sale price. Not only did the Flatiron District stay at the same price point as last year, but sales in both neighborhoods remained nearly unchanged: Both closed just one additional sale in the second quarter of this year, but the West Village saw its price rise by more than one-third.
Brooklyn Home to Widest Swings in Sales Activity With Greenpoint & Boerum Hill, Queens Stands Out with 190% Price Surge in Little Neck
While sales and prices ticked down in Manhattan and Queens, along with sales in the Bronx, Brooklyn went against citywide trends. Its median rose 12% Y-o-Y and the number of sales inched up 2% during the same period. Consequently, many of the most notable changes in sales and pricing took place in Brooklyn neighborhoods.
For example, Greenwood Heights was not just the #13 most expensive neighborhood in NYC in Q2, but it also recorded a 180% Y-o-Y increase in sales. Granted, in terms of actual sales, that translated to an increase from last year’s five sales to 14 in Q2 2024.
Then, Greenpoint (#21) went even further and logged a 253% surge in sales activity by closing 120 sales in the second quarter alone, more than half of which (67) originated at 29 Huron St. An additional 13 transactions were concentrated at 173 McGuinness Blvd.
Over in Queens, Queensboro Hill seemingly showed the third-most significant increase in sales at 80% Y-o-Y. Even so, in terms of actual sales, that translated to nine deals inked in the last three months, compared to just five in the same period last year.
At the other end of the spectrum, Carroll Gardens’ 63% Y-o-Y drop in sales was surpassed by only Boerum Hill’s 68% fall: It went from 53 sales in Q2 2023 to just 17 in Q2 2024.
On top of that, Boerum Hill also underwent one of the sharpest price contractions (-27% Y-o-Y) among the city’s richest neighborhoods after dropping by more than half a million to $1.4 million. In this case, both the neighborhood’s price and sales drops were heavily influenced by sales at 533 Pacific Ave., which accounted for 35 of the 53 sales in Q2 2023. For comparison, the building’s year-ago median sale price was $2.2 million.
Prices fell even more in Clinton Hill (#47) and Gowanus (#19) at -30% Y-o-Y and -44% Y-o-Y, respectively, logging the sharpest price drops among the city’s most exclusive neighborhoods. Gowanus’ sharp pricing drop was the result of a significant decrease in the average size of sold units, going from last year’s 1,918 square feet to just 1,393 square feet at the end of last month.
Similarly, Clinton Hill’s median sale price fell by more than $1 million after pricey sales pushed up last year’s figures. More precisely, nearly one-quarter of the neighborhood’s sales in Q2 2023 originated at 532 Clinton St. with a building median price of $2.26 million. In contrast, no sales were logged there during the last three months. In fact, just one Clinton Hill sale surpassed $2 million in Q2 2024.
On the other hand, Carroll Gardens and Madison logged some of the most notable price increases among NYC’s 50 most expensive neighborhoods by jumping 75% and 59%, respectively. Madison’s pricing surge was driven by a change in property types sold: Single family homes accounted for 80% of sales during the last three months here, compared to just half during the same period last year.
But, the two Brooklyn neighborhoods were surpassed by Little Neck in Queens (+190%) and Fieldston (+257%) in the Bronx. Despite finishing as the #36 most expensive in the city, Little Neck’s impressive price surge lifted the neighborhood median to almost the million-dollar threshold ($988,000). Here, too, changes were driven by the increase in single family home sales, which made up 19% last year compared to 64% in Q2 2024.
For more information, explore New York City’s 50 most expensive neighborhoods in Q2 2024 in the interactive table below:
Methodology
Median sale prices were calculated based on closed residential property sales recorded in ACRIS between April 1 and June 30, 2023, and April 1 and June 30, 2024. Residential asset types included were single family homes, condos and co-ops. Package deals were excluded.
Median sale prices were calculated only for neighborhoods that recorded at least five sales between April 1 and June 30, 2024. Year-over-year changes in median sale prices or the number of sales were calculated only for neighborhoods that also recorded a minimum of five sales between April 1 and June 30, 2023. Additionally, median sale prices were rounded to the nearest $1,000.
