Is New York City Declining?

When serious people want to see New York City’s future, they look first at real estate. Surely one of the most expensive cities in the world, New York currently appears to have lost its panache. Fewer people are coming to New York. More people are leaving. Rental prices are down. Purchase prices for condos and co-ops are generally down. To be sure, some properties are selling-- my agent neighbor told me so the other day-- and yet, we are only at the early stages of New York’s decline. 

One quarter does not a trend make. And yet, considering the problems with rising crime, a grossly incompetent mayor, and a school system that is being absurdly mismanaged, one imagines that the early indications of New York’s decline are correct. Better yet, in a city where 1% of the people pay 40% of the taxes, when a certifiable imbecile like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez suggests an extra tax on billionaires, the giant sucking sound you hear is the exodus of billionaires and the loss of New York’s tax revenue. The truth is: when you elect people like Comrade de Blasio and AOC, your city is doomed.

Fox Business has the story, beginning with lower rents:

Declining apartment demand attributable to the coronavirus crisis is causing a record number of New York City landlords to cut prices.

Rent prices were discounted across 34.7 percent of properties in the Big Apple during the second quarter, according to new data from real estate website StreetEasy.

The median asking price fell by 6.7 percent, which is about $221 per month or $2,652 per year, due to reduced demand.

Higher-end apartments saw the largest price cuts – as wealthy buyers have flocked to the suburbs since March.

And prices may be headed even lower in the near future.

“Demand will remain low as new hires, interns and students begin jobs and school remotely, and as many New Yorkers escape the city temporarily or permanently,” Nancy Wu, StreetEasy Economist, told FOX Business. “As inventory piles up due to this lack in demand, even more landlords will need to make rent cuts, and rents will likely drop even further.”

People who keep a finger on the pulse of New York City look at the moving companies. They, more than anyone, will know how many locals are planning to move out of the city:

As previously reported by FOX Business, moving companies said they were experiencing an “insane” uptick in demand as residents looked to leave Manhattan during the pandemic.

While some people were headed to suburbs in the near vicinity, others were picking up and heading to states in the south, like Florida and the Carolinas.

So, the movement out of New York is beginning to pick up speed. We will continue to follow the story, religiously. 

One notes, in passing, that one’s own neighborhood is largely unaffected by the rioting, the looting and the spike in crime. If the city continues on a downward spiral, it will not much matter.