Click chart for larger version. (Source: Citi Habitats)

Manhattan rental transactions surged in the fourth quarter of 2009, while rents dropped modestly, according to market reports released by two large city brokerages today (see full reports after the jump). A marketwide report released by Prudential Douglas Elliman estimated that the number of rental deals in Manhattan leaped 47.6 percent to 2,456 in the fourth quarter, from 1,665 in the same period of 2008. Citi Habitats, the city’s largest rental brokerage, said it did more than 2,600 transactions in the fourth quarter, an increase of 30 percent from roughly 1,800 in the prior-year-quarter.
(In a market where rental data is notoriously difficult to obtain, firms use different data to compile their reports.) Moreover, listing inventory dropped 21 percent to 5,255 units, from 6,640 during the fourth quarter of 2008, according to the Elliman report, which was prepared by appraiser Jonathan Miller, president and CEO of real estate appraisal firm Miller Samuel.
The upswing in activity “is a positive development, and we’ll take it,” Miller said, though he noted that the fourth quarter of 2008 saw particularly low levels of activity because of the Lehman Brothers collapse.
“There was clearly a surge in activity coming from a very low point from this time last year, which was post-Lehman,” he said.
Rental prices, meanwhile, are lower than last year, but not drastically so.
Citi Habitats, which only tracks apartments rented by its own agents, said average rents fell between 5.8 and 7.3 percent year-over-year, and dipped 1.5 to 3.3 percent from the third quarter. [more]

Click map for larger version (Source: PropertyShark)

An uptick in sales activity has slowed the once-rapid decline in the Manhattan real estate market, according to fourth-quarter 2009 market reports released by the city’s major brokerages today (see reports after the jump), though experts still fear a double-dip in prices. Sales activity jumped and inventory shrank in the fourth quarter, the reports show, though prices were still far below 2008 levels. Experts attributed the positive signs to low interest rates, pent-up demand from a slow winter, and falling prices. “This surge in activity and sharp drop in inventory has stopped prices from essentially hemorrhaging,” said appraiser Jonathan Miller, president and CEO of Miller Samuel and the preparer of Prudential Douglas Elliman’s fourth-quarter report. “We’re looking at a much more modest decline.”  More

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SL Green Realty said it completed a $215 million deal to refinance 100
Park Avenue, a luxury office tower between 40th and 41st streets that
it owns under a joint venture with Prudential Real Estate Investors.
Two German lenders, DekaBank and Helaba, led a group of banks in the
refinancing of 100 Park Avenue. The other lenders include PB Capital,
Westdeutsche ImmobilienBank AG and Modern Bank.
The deal is significant because it shows that experienced and
financially stable developers will be able to finance new deals despite
the weak lending environment stemming from the 2008 collapse of the
capital markets, according to analysts.
“For those owners who can stabilize their portfolio and the debt
service associated with it, they’re going to be in a better position to
weather the ongoing storm,” said Steve Coutts, senior vice president of
research at Studley. [more]

Before collateralized mortgage-backed securities, one of the best
sources of real estate mortgages came from insurance companies. The
Mortgage Bankers Association estimates that approximately $222 billion
in direct mortgage loans are held by life insurance companies maturing
through 2018. Earlier this month, Commercial Mortgage Alert noted that loan originations
by the 30 insurance organizations with the largest mortgage portfolios
plunged by 35 percent in 2009, to $36.7 billion from $56.8 billion last
year, according to its annual survey of lending by life insurers. The
report notes that the total value of outstanding loans by these 30 insurers
is $260.8 billion, a slight increase of 3.7 percent from the prior
year. [more]