[hypervisorxxx]

The other thing not being mentioned is alot of families who could never afford to buy homes can now buy homes.

It has also allowed alot of people to move into nicer areas of NYC that could not afford to before.

Alot of people's quality of life has increased, and alot of people who lost their income on paper also lost their requirement to pay rent and avoid being evicted or just moved into their parents homes.

There are some who have lost their income but also still have to pay bills and their quality of life has not improved. I think those numbers are not reflected in this article especially in relation to all of the people who could not afford to live in nice areas or buy homes who have now been able to.

In NYC when asian demographic no longer could come to the u.s. To invest $300k into an empty apartment building that they will never inhabit to expedite their green card process, are now being inhabited by hardworking Americans who were able to buy condos that previously they were not able to compete with with international millionaires using real estate for tax and legal loopholes.

None of this is reflected in the article.

[est31]

Do you have a link for real estate prices going down? From what I saw it was mainly the rents that decreased.

[ssully]

Real estate prices are absolutely not going down. There was a dip at the onset of the pandemic, but prices started going back up in May and normalized over the summer.

There is speculation house prices will continue to rise into next year due to supply constraints (new house construction slowed from March-May and is still recovering, houses that do on the market are picked up quick, etc), but we will see how it plays out.

[1]: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/ASPNHSUS

[khalilravanna]

Not directly in line with OP’s comment but interest rates are stupidly low right now. Wouldn’t surprise me if this enables a lot of people to buy homes. I know several people (late 20s, early 30s Boston area) who have bought homes recently and I myself am refinancing.

[uoaei]

Interest rates don't mean anything if the down payment (or requirements for a loan) are still high for new buyers.

Interest rates only matter if you already have money. Most people don't.

[khalilravanna]

Requirements are pretty low for loans. I have a friend with not too much income who secured one. I myself was able to get a house with something like 5% down which on a house in Texas was like ~$10k.

Lower interest rates equate to a noticeably lower monthly payment so I wouldn’t toss it out completely as a factor.

[hypervisorxxx]

I don't know all of the dynamics of real estate pricing in NYC so I won't surmise too much but here's what I can say:

Alot of people I know who were living in the city got mortgages and bought houses for great prices in really upscale suburbs outside of the city, the final push to realize they needed more space when working at home when their kids are also not leaving for school, when otherwise a family with an middle or upper middle class income might be able to scrap by in NYC. So the real estate prices may not be changing much in NYC because people are not willing to sell right now because they know it won't be like this forever, but definitely mortgages are "free money" in the words of my mentor ( a hardworking devops guy for twenty years who was born and up till now raised a family in a nice neighborhood in brooklyn just moved to a suburb ) and in those cases there has actually been a surge of competitive real estate pricing in the suburbs of big cities that it has become competitive.

I can't say for NYC itself as most people I know who were in the position to buy a house but waiting for the right time decided to move outside of the city. In my building the number of units for sale has quadrupled since covid but I didn't track what buy priced were before. I rent in a nice condo building and my apartment was $3700 before covid and the same floorplans are going for $2250 right now with a quadruple in vacancy in the building.

I think one thing I know is commerical leases are not dropping the way residential is so restaurants really cannot pay rent. I am not sure how commercial and residential pricing is averaged together to reflect overall real estate pricing in NYC.

I know for the few of my younger friends / aka single without kids buying their first condo in the city it became much easier without the competition of international millionaires. I am not sure if they got the places for cheaper or just ended up being the best option over someone with millions in the bank already/mostly asian millionaires.

Wish I had a better breakdown but that has been my experience.

In brooklyn there are alot of midwesterners who don't have careers that are otherwise service industry workers who have used the drop in rent to move into the city when otherwise it was too competitive. My chiropractors assistants who lived in brooklyn their whole lives now have nice one bedrooms in manhattan and can walk to work.

Homeless people for a while are being put up in nice hotels to stop the spread of covid and have experienced a higher quality of life than they have before.

I would say I've seen a net move up in quality of life even if the richest people with vacation homes fled because they had somewhere to flee to.

[calcifer]

> None of this is reflected in the article.

Well, you haven't supported any of your claims with data, unlike the article.