REAL-ESTATE PRICES FALL, SALES LEAP IN NY

       Apartment prices in New York's Manhattan fell for a second consecutive quarter, helping to drive the biggest gain in sales in more than 13 years as buyers seized on discounts.
       The median price slid 8.4 per clent to US$850,000 (Bt28.43 million) in the third quarter year on year, New York appraiser Miller Samuel and broker Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Esrare said. The number of sales jumped 46 per cent from the second quarter, the biggest third-quarter increase since 1996.
       Values fell for cooperatives and condominiums of every size and price as New York City's unemployment rate jumped to 10.3 per clent in August. While the declines weren't as deep as those in the second quarter, Manhattan is far from recovering from a recession and global credit crisis that have led to the loss of more than 183,000 banking and securities jobs in the Americas. Year on year, thid-quarter sales declined by 16 per cent.
       "We're turning the corner, but we are not at a bottom," Miller Samuel president Jonathan Miller said. 'We still have very tight credit, elevated unemployment and we have shadown inventory."
       There are about 6,000 apartinents in new developments that haven't been listed for sale, he said.
       Five reports issued last week showed overall price declines in Manhattan. The Corcoran Group, which conducts its survey with research company PropertyShark.com, said the median dropped 18 per cent from a year earlier. Brown harris Stevens and Halstead Property put the decline at 14 per clent and StreetEasy.com said the drop was 12 per cent.
       Studio apartment prices fell 6 per cent from a year earlier to a median of $399,000, Miller Samuel said. One-bedrooms dropped 11 per cent to $645,000; two-bedrooms fell 23 per cent to $1.18 million and three-bedrooms dropped 41 per cent to $2.25 million.
       Four bedroom apartments plunged 49 per cent to a median of $5.18 million, reflecting, in part, a decline in luxury sales, Millar said. Those sales declined 16 per cent. The luxury segment is defined as the top 10 per cent of co-op and condo sales.
       "There were many meaningful price reductions which clearly drove buyers back in to the market," said Corcoran Group chief executive Pamela Liebman.
       James Kennedy, 53, was among the beneficiaries. Kennedy, an attorney at the Wall Street law firm of Kennedy Johnson Gallagher, started an apartment search in the middle of 2008, hoping to move into Manhattan from Staten Island when his daughter left for college last month.
       His year-long search got him more apartment for his money, he said. In August Kennedy bought a 201-square-metre condo in the Financial District. The price was reduced by 16 per cent.
       "I wanted to take advantage of the softening in the market and, for $1.6 million, I came away with an apartment that two years ago would have cost substantially more," Kennedy said. The Rector Street apartment has views of Governor's Island and the Statue of Liberty and is within walking distance of his office.
       "My friends have apartment envy," he said.
       About 36 per cent of third-quarter listings included discounts from the original asking price, according to StreetEasy.com, a service that complies listings from brokers.
       About 2,900 cooperative apartments were listed with price cuts, a 77-per-cent increase from a year earlier. There were also 2,400 condo listings with price cuts, 72-per-cent more than last year, StreetEasy said.
       In midtown, condo owners pared an average of 8.3 per cent off their asking prices, while downtown owners trimmed 8.4 per cent.