Jonathan Miller takes a look at what’s happened to Manhattan apartment prices over the past three years — since, more or less, the national housing market peaked in 2005. On a year-over-year basis, it turns out, Manhattan co-ops have appreciated in value by $109,596 a year for the past three years, while Manhattan condos have gone up by $166,937 a year for the past three years.
Obviously, these numbers don’t translate easily to any particular ROI: that would depend greatly on your downpayment, your mortgage payments, your tax rate, etc etc. But even so, it’s a pretty safe assumption that the housing wealth of most Manhattan apartment owners has been rising at a six-figure-per-year pace even as the rest of the country has been suffering. For big apartments with four or more bedrooms, make that a seven-figure-per-year pace. This is clearly unsustainable, but when it will stop is anybody’s guess.