Key Highlights
- Luxury home sales propelled +41.5% in Q3 2020, according to Redfin
- Palm Beach saw sales volume jump +62%, according to report from Douglas Elliman and Miller Samuel
- Sales in the Hamptons increased +51% in Q3
- Former renters in Aspen and Telluride CO and Greenwich CT now looking to buy
Potential buyers with opportunities to work remotely are coming out of the woodwork from Texas, Florida, New York and California to buy homes, particularly luxury homes, in vacation towns such as Jackson Hole WY, Lake Tahoe CA, Aspen and Telluride CO, Palm Beach FL and the Hamptons.
In Palm Beach, for example, Diana Koch with the Koch Team at the Corcoran Group, said, “We normally average roughly like $200 plus million on an annual basis, and during the first three quarters, we’ve sold $350M worth of real estate.”
In Aspen CO, Steven Shane, an agent with Compass, said that New Yorkers, Californians, Floridians and Texans have put down their roots and enrolled their children in Aspen schools for the now necessary amenity of more space. Shane said, “People learned that they can work from anywhere…and their children might be attending school remotely. So why not be in Aspen, Greenwich CT or the Hamptons?”
We’ve covered sales in the Hamptons quite extensively but just remember that as of Q3, home sales in the Hamptons increased +51% y/y at all price points along with transactions in the stratospheric range of +$20M to +$40M.
Luxury home sales have, of course, buoyed in non-vacation towns as well. Think the East Bay area of CA such as Oakland, Berkeley and Hayward. DJ Grubb, president of Grubb Company Realtors in the East Bay, has been seeing nearly frenetic activity at the higher end of the housing market including all-cash buyers and buyers wanting to optimize lower mortgage rates.
Grubb said, “I have a lot of people moving within town, and a lot of Millennials coming out of San Francisco, that having just gone through COVID that are now coming over to the East Bay and finding the East Bay a very good buy, whether it be in the million five range or up to $5M range…” while the “wealthy, wealthy” are moving to Lake Tahoe, Jackson and Telluride.
Also think Miami, a beneficiary of the trending urban exodus due to both the pandemic and Florida’s favorable tax situation. Miami realtor Ines Flax with One Sotheby’s International is anticipating a much busier winter than last largely because both public and private schools in the Miami have had 3X the amount of students applying.
Flax said, “We used to have five of the (mega mansion) sales a year in Miami Dade (County)…and now we’ve seen 20. Just five sold on Star Island within the last six months. The cheapest sale on Star Island was like $19M, and that was a plot (of undeveloped land).”
Thanks to HousingWire.
Also read: What’s Going On In Luxury Markets?, Will Housing Market Rebound Continue?, Lux Home Prices Rise for First Time in Almost a Year
