Buying A House in NYC in 2025 – What To Expect

Do you need a broker to buy an apartment in NYC? Legally, no. You are perfectly within your rights to look for, negotiate, and close an apartment on your own. However, whether it’s smarter to work with a New York City broker or do it on your own is a different question. 

The mortgage rates in NYC (at the time of writing this) are hovering between 6.25% and 6.8% for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages. However, the answer is, what is today’s mortgage rate in NYC? Keeps on changing, often daily. So, the best place to get this answer is local, NYC-based sources or other aggregate sources that offer this information for multiple cities. 

Over 69% of the condos in Manhattan closed for more than $1 million in October 2024. So, in a way, most millionaire condo owners are technically millionaires and are spread out over the city. But if you set a higher bar (multi-millionaires) and wonder where do the millionaires live in NYC? we can narrow down the selections. It’s worth noting that New York has one of the highest concentrations of millionaires in the world, with about 349,500 millionaires (one in every 24 people in the city), and 744 of them are cent millionaires, with a net worth of over $100 million.

Are NYC real estate prices dropping? Many potential buyers repeatedly ask this question to find the best time to enter the market. As per the NYC Comptroller report, median home values in the city were falling at the beginning of the year. However, if we look at the “All-Transactions House Price Index for New York,” it has risen for both the first and second quarter of 2024, and the upward momentum is not waning, which indicates that the prices are still going up. However, another report suggests that the median asking price has remained steady between April and September (at $1,1 million).

If you ask your New York City broker, “Where is the most desirable place to live in Manhattan?” they would ask a few questions to narrow down the neighborhood most desirable for you. These questions would start from your budget – how much rent or mortgage you can afford, what type of property and space you want, etc. However, several other factors apply to almost everyone who lives and wants to live in Manhattan, like green spaces, the environment, activities, easy commute, etc.

Getting approved as a buyer is mainly a co-op problem. If you are buying a condo, the board does have some power to reject you through the “right of first refusal,” but this rarely happens. However, the co-op board approval process can be quite hard when buying a co-op apartment. You need stellar financials, a solid application, a good board interview, and multiple reference letters. Even then, it’s usually a good idea to work with a New York City broker who works with that co-op and knows the board’s process and preferences to make approval easier. 

If you want to buy a home in the city, it’s natural to ask, “What is the most desirable neighborhood in New York?” But the answer is not as straightforward as you might think. Desirability can be highly subjective, and what’s most desirable to some may not be as desirable to others. There are also no formal rankings for neighborhoods in NYC that we can leverage to identify the most desirable neighborhood. We looked into several lists, and Greenwich Village (in Manhattan) was either at the top or in the top five of most of them. 

What does it take to buy an apartment in NYC? The simplest answer is enough money and a good New York City broker. However, a decision as important as buying an apartment in NYC is rarely as simple.