The Condo Issue: Booming Coast to Coast

Not all condo booms are created equal, but they're certainly being welcomed in markets from South Florida to San Francisco. (No more waiting for July 4th or a tense family reunion for fireworks.)

Speculators aren't fueling the Miami condo boom like they did during the mid-2000s, Miller Samuel prez Jonathan Miller tells us. “Only about four years ago, the Miami condo market was the poster child for a collapsed market,” Jonathan says. “Since then, it's morphed into a luxury brand.” The current boom is still dominated by cash buyers, and he expects that trend to continue this year. During the last boom, people quit their day jobs and became speculators with a short-term view of the market. “More of the current pool of buyers have a long-term outlook. They aren't buying to flip, so the expansion is more sustainable.”

Here's a market pic from George Miquilena. Some takeaways from Douglas Elliman's Q4 South Florida condo reports (which Jonathan prepared): The median sales price for all Miami condos was up over 14% since last year, and while the number of sales edged up only 0.4%, total sales were still the highest for a Q4 in more than seven years. Non-distressed market share (which leaves out those pesky foreclosures and short sales) rose 8.7 percentage points since last year to 67.2% of the overall market in Q4. 2014 outlook: more price growth, but the pace of growth will probably ease as supply comes on line, Jonathan says. “Buyers will continue to come from overseas and the Northeast.”

A San Francisco report reveals the city-wide median sales price for a condo in 2013 was just shy of $840k, which is way up from about $660k in 2009. (To be fair, the condo is the same price: it's the gallon of gasoline foolishly stored in the closet that's skyrocketed.) Jackson Fuller's S.F. real estate report includes stats for every one of S.F.'s 80-plus neighborhoods. Matt Fuller, a Zephyr agent and Jackson Fuller co-founder, tells us it's remarkable to see almost 3,000 condos sold in the MLS. (In 2009, it was nearly 1,800.)

That's good news for Tishman Speyer and China Vanke's 655-unit, two-tower condo project going up at 201 Folsom (above). According to the report, condos in the Inner Mission sold for 16% over the asking price, on average, while those in the Inner Sunset went for an average of 17% over asking price. Matt says the S.F. market was strong across the board. The median days on the market for condos in Cow Hollow was 25 in 2013; in Pacific Heights, it was 24.