Cash is king when it comes to buying a home in Manhattan.
Stubbornly high mortgage rates and other factors are making the average NYC buyer skittish, but luxury home shoppers have no such qualms, new data reveals.
Cash deals accounted for a record-breaking 69% of Manhattan homebuying in the second quarter of 2025, according to a quarterly report by Miller Samuel for Douglas Elliman.
In the meantime, the overall market is showing signs of a slowdown. While cash sales surged, deals involving financing contingencies — in which the buyer won’t be penalized if they can’t secure financing — reached the second-highest level in a decade.
Report author Miller Samuel told The Real Deal these opposing trends reflect a market that is “highly polarized.”
The imbalance in Manhattan real estate can be traced, in part, to financial markets.
Samuel told the outlet that success in the luxury market is closely linked to the success of financial markets. When Wall Street does well, so does Billionaire’s Row.
Cash deals this spring spiked by 23%, according to the quarterly report. Luxury sales, meaning the top 10% of co-op and condo sales, outpaced the overall market. This segment of Manhattan real estate started at $4.5 million last quarter and claimed a median sales price of $6.52 million.
Keller Williams’ Nicole Gary told the Post in early April that long-vacant luxury units were starting to move, after the city’s ultra-luxury market had its best quarter in six years.
“People always feel that Manhattan real estate is a safe bet. It’s a hedge against inflation, and it’s a place where people feel safe when you know the stock market is volatile,” Gary said.
Closed luxury sales rose by 18% year-over year, and fierce competition reduced high-end inventory by 21%.
The rest of the market remains chained to the harsh realities of financing a home in 2025.
While overall transactions last quarter rose by more than 16% year-over-year, Manhattan’s average home buyer still enjoyed cooler spring temperatures.
Median prices in the overall market saw less than a 2% uptick — up to a median of $1.2 million — compared to the same time last year, while overall inventory eked up by 3%.
Miller told The Real Deal that he expects a greater slowdown to come, however.
The pace of real estate means that a bulk of closings last quarter were in the works long before Trump’s market-shaking tariffs hit Wall Street wallets.
It remains to be seen whether market anxieties will affect the summertime shopping of Manhattan’s unflappable, insatiable cash buyers.
