Condo Prices Already Dropped By Up To 33% In 24 Bigger Markets

Authored by Wolf Richter via Wolf Street,

The price drops are getting relentlessly steeper: In 24 bigger markets, prices of mid-tier condos through April have dropped by 15% to 33% from their respective peaks between 2021 and 2024.

Each of the markets is shown in a chart below: 24 mindboggling charts, depicting breath-taking price explosions, especially from mid-2020 to mid-2022, exceeding 50%, 60%, or even 70% in just two years in some cities. In the 10 years to the peak, prices had soared by 180% to 350% in these markets. And these bubbles have started to deflate.

In 2 of the cities, prices of mid-tier condos dropped by over 30%. In five other markets, prices dropped by 20% to 28%. In another 3 cities, prices dropped by 19%. These are starting to be substantial declines over a multiyear period.

In several of these markets, condo prices have now dropped below their peaks of Housing Bubble 1 in 2006/2007 and are back where they'd been 20 years ago. In a few other markets, prices have dropped close to their peaks of Housing Bubble 1. Those charts are marked with a red line.

There are also many smaller markets where condo prices have dropped just as much or more, but that are not included here because they're too small.

Most of the markets here are "cities." But the line-up also includes three counties where the cities, though household names, are too small to be included individually. And it includes one metropolitan statistical area, the Lakeland-Winter Haven MSA in Florida, for the same reason.

In some densely populated cities, condos and co-ops make up a big part or the majority of home sales. In most other markets, condos are a much smaller portion of home sales.

Those That Didn't Make The 15% Cutoff

In many cities, condo prices have dropped by 14% or less, and they didn't make the 15% cutoff here. Below is a sample list of 41 bigger cities where prices have dropped by 7% to 14% from their respective peaks.

Methodology and data: These prices here are seasonally adjusted three-month averages of "mid-tier" condos and co-ops from the Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI), which is based on millions of data points in Zillow's "Database of All Homes," including from public records (tax data), MLS, brokerages, local Realtor Associations, real-estate agents, and households across the US. It includes pricing data for off-market deals and for-sale-by-owner deals. These are not median prices.

The Condo Bust By Market In 24 Charts

The tables for each market below show from left to right: price decline from the peak, change from prior month (MoM), change year-over-year (YoY), and remaining increase since January 2000.

Prices in Oakland are back to where they'd first been in mid-2005, and that was 21 years ago. Prices are down a lot, but are still very high.

Prices in Fort Myers are back where they'd first been in April 2006, exactly 20 years ago.

Prices in Sarasota County are back where they'd first been in early 2006, exactly 20 years ago.

The county forms the northern portion of Silicon Valley.

Condos As Home, Rental Property, Or Speculative Bet

Some people buy condos as a home to live in an urban center or along the shore, to enjoy the big views, nice amenities, or central location. They value the worry-free living, such as not having to mess with maintenance, repairs, and yardwork; or having staff at a desk by the front door. Some value not having to climb stairs, etc.

Others buy condos as rental properties as a way to get into the multifamily rental business, or they try their hand at short-term vacation rentals. Or they buy them as vacation homes. Others, especially nonresident foreign investors, buy condos to park some cash in the US and watch the price spiral higher from a distance. It's these investors and speculators that make condos particularly speculative.

A Reminder Of The Special Issues That Condos Confront

• Over the long term, land appreciates, most buildings depreciate to zero and are eventually torn down. The land that big condo buildings sit on can be very valuable, but each condo owner only owns a tiny slice of it. The rest of their investment is in the building. A single-family house may sit on less valuable land, but the homeowner gets 100% of any appreciation of the land.
• Prices that exploded over the past few years ended up being way too high, once the mania settled down.
• Hefty special assessments, or the fear of them, for long-neglected major repairs dog some older condo buildings.
• Big increases in HOA fees at many properties, partly driven by spiking insurance costs in natural disaster zones, add substantially to the monthly costs of condos.
• If a condo building is on Fannie Mae's Blacklist, financing a unit in that building gets very difficult, and sales may be limited to cash buyers who'll exact their pound of flesh.
• The Free Money has ended, and mortgage rates are roughly back to a normal range. Buyers of single-family homes face the same issue.
• Foreign-based owners who've had it with the US and want to sell. And there are fewer foreign-based buyers.
• Investors in condos as rental properties are facing stiff competition from a wave of newly completed higher-end apartment buildings that developers are trying to find tenants for.