New York, northern NJ among nation’s top 10 buyers’ markets

While U.S. home values enjoyed a slight year-over-year uptick in August, some markets continue to prove especially favorable to either buyers or sellers.

For home seekers in the New York and northern New Jersey areas, the market is especially ripe for buyers at the moment, according to the latest Zillow analysis of buyers’ and sellers’ markets nationwide. According to the findings, the New York area market ranked eighth nationwide among top buyers’ markets, because the area is seeing conditions that leave home seekers less likely to face the fierce bidding wars common along the West Coast. Providence, Cleveland, Philadelphia and Milwaukee topped the best buyers’ markets list.

Zillow’s market findings based on actual sales prices compared to asking prices

As for the top sellers’ markets, so-named not necessarily because home values are rising but because homes on the market for a shorter time see price cuts occurring less frequently, the Big Apple and northern New Jersey didn’t make the top 10 cut. That list was topped by San Jose, San Francisco, Seattle, Dallas-Fort Worth and Denver.

“We now have several different types of markets emerging, including markets that are still muddling along the bottom, markets that shot up immediately after the recession ended and are now cooling quickly and markets that are still very hot,” Stan Humphries, Zillow’s chief economist, said in the report. “Each of these environments presents unique challenges and opportunities for buyers and sellers and what works in one area won’t necessarily work in another.” [Business Insider via Zillow] — Julie Strickland