Westchester home prices continued climbing in 2024 as sales dipped, according to a report by Houlihan Lawrence.
The report released on Dec. 23 showed median sale prices of single-family homes went up 8.2% to $930,750 from 2024 while sales dropped slightly by 1.5%.
Although the Federal Reserve granted three interest rate cuts last year, the residential real estate market in the Lower Hudson Valley coped with low inventory and relatively high mortgage interest, which drove up home prices and kept sales down.
With demand high in the suburbs as the pandemic waned in 2021, home sale prices continued soaring. Median sale prices in Westchester jumped by nearly 41% from $660,000 in 2019 to $930,750 in 2024. In the summer, home prices reached a historic height of $1.18 million in August after they had topped $1 million first time ever in June.
More: This $26M mansion marks 2024’s highest single-home sale in Rockland. See inside
A historic home of the former New York Supreme Court Judge Arthur Tompkins is on the market at $3.3 million.
How did 2024 look for luxury home sales in Westchester?
A report by William Pitt-Julia B. Fee Sotheby’s International Realty issued on Jan. 7 showed while overall home sales fell by 5%, sales of luxury homes — houses sold at more than $2 million — went up by 27.6%.
Yonkers had the highest number of homes sold (369) in 2024 in Westchester. Bronxville held the highest median home prices at $2.75 million and Dobbs Ferry saw the fastest growth by 52%.
Sale prices of condos and co-ops also followed the trend with median prices increasing by 8% and 5.9%, respectively. Sales of condos went up by 9% while co-ops fell by 13.7%.
Neighboring counties, including Putnam and Dutchess, also saw declines in sales. Sales of single-family homes dropped in Putnam by 9% from 2023 to 2024, and in Dutchess by 8.7%. Median sale prices were up by 14% and 10.8% in Putnam and Dutchess, respectively. Homes sold over $1 million in Putnam and Dutchess combined saw a 66% jump in sales.
The report did not cover Rockland County.
A federal colonial home at 139 Hillair Circle made the highest sale ever in White Plains
What the home sales report means
Liz Nunan, president and CEO of Houlihan Lawrence, said in the report that the outlook for 2025 remains positive with home sales and prices expected to grow at a more sustainable pace.
“Moderating mortgage rates may help create a more normalized market environment, potentially easing conditions for buyers while maintaining opportunities for sellers,” Nunan said.
The optimism is in part because of positive signs in final quarter of 2024. Paul Breunich, chairman and chief executive officer at William Pitt-Julia B. Fee Sotheby’s International Realty, said almost every market they serve experienced increases in sales in the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to 2023, including part of New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts state.
Single-family home sales in Westchester and Putnam saw an increase by 6.7% and 2% in the fourth quarter, respectively.
“This is the first time we have seen consistent unit growth nearly across the board in more than three years, since the pandemic sales surge finally began to slow during the second half of 2021,” Breunich said in the report. “The gains were not high enough for annual increases in unit sales to pull ahead of the full calendar year of 2023, but the quarterly growth tells us that a shift is underway.”
Helu Wang covers real estate, economic growth and development for The Journal News/lohud and USA Today Network. Reach her at hwang@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Rockland/Westchester Journal News: Westchester real estate: Home prices climbed, sales dipped. Here’s why