Developers’ mad dash for land is driving prices sky high

Property prices are reaching record highs as developers make wild bids to claim available land, Crain’s reported. Eastern Consolidated, for example, had a client that lost out on a West 77th Street site when a competitor bid nearly 50 percent over the original price, insiders said.

“There is a scarcity of good development land in Manhattan,” Peter Hauspurg, Eastern Consolidated’s chief executive, told Crain’s. “Pricing has almost now doubled from the peak of 2007.”

Developers now pay $700 to $800 per square foot available for construction, Crain’s reported. They tend to go into more modest neighborhoods, looking for vacant sites or buildings that can be quickly torn down. [Crain’s] –Mark Maurer