The Biggest, the Smallest and the Longest DOM
In 2024, we had 500 single family home sales which is well below our 10-year pre-Covid average of 621 sales. Given how little inventory we had all year, it is actually surprising that we did this well.
We had the tightest market ever with only 88 listings at the beginning of 2024. At that time, most price ranges all the way up to $4 million only had a few weeks of supply. Buyer demand was high and houses that had sat on the market for years were selling.
Fast forward to December 2024 and our months of supply is still way under 6 months of supply, the traditional dividing line between a buyer’s and a seller’s market. All the way up to $5 million we are under 3 months of supply; what I call a super-seller’s market
Overall, 2024 was a white-knuckle ride. If you wanted a to buy in Greenwich, you had to move quickly or see the value in the houses that others had picked over. So, let’s take a look at the highlights and lowlights of this year’s market.
Highest Sale Price
- By Neighborhoods over $10 Million.
- South of Post Road – 21 Vista Rd – $31,500,000 (RPO)
- Mid-country – 22 Dairy Rd – $16,250,000
- Backcountry – 74 Lower Cross Rd – $11,000,000
- Riverside – 42 Dawn Harbor Lane – $10,950.000
Probably no market changed more year to year than our over $10 million market. We have had 17 sales over $10 million this year and we had another 4 private sales. (Stay tuned, next week’s article is about the 20% of the market that were our private sales.) In 2023, we only had 12 sales over $10 million in 2023, so the high-end is doing well.
This year our highest priced sale of the year was in the Indian Harbor Association at 22 Vista Drive for $31,500,00 which many years ago had been Ivana and Donald Trump’s place. Last year our highest sale was for $17.6 million in backcountry.
The highest sale appeared on the GMLS for “recording purposes only” as it had been on and off the market for several years and at the time it sold it wasn’t publicly listed. The highest active listing was 22 Dairy Road at $16,250,000, which had been on for 189 days, when it went to non-contingent contract.
When the stock market does well the Greenwich high-end market does well. The stock market is up and crypto is way up. Both markets are volatile and taking some money off the table and putting it into Greenwich real estate can be prudent estate planning.
BTW: These numbers are all based on the Greenwich MLS numbers and do not include private sales, which as I said, I’ll write about next week. Our private sales show a bifurcated curve with more private sales below $1.5 million and above $6.5 million.
Lowest Sales Price
- By Neighborhood
- Byram – 127 Henry St – $515,000
- South of Parkway – 22 Grand St – $610,000
- Pemberwick – 29 Pemberwick – $725,000
- South of Post Road – 24 Prospect St – $750,000
As you might expect our lowest priced sales was in Byram followed by Chickahominy, two of our most affordable neighborhoods. Our next lowest priced sale was in Pemberwick and was over $700K. The median house sales price in the State of Connecticut is around $400,000. This year, like the past several years, we had no sales under $400,000 and we only had these two sales under $700K.
None of our lowest priced houses are in move-in condition, so these sales prices do not reflect the buyer’s total first year costs. If you are looking for a bargain in Greenwich, they are all gone, so if you are looking for a house under $1,000,000 be prepared to move quickly. Right now, in mid-January 2025, you have a choice of one house under $1 million and it’s listed for $825,000.
Biggest House Sold
Our biggest house sold this year was also the highest priced at 21 Vista Drive at 19,786 s.f. Our second biggest house was at 18 Simmons Lane at 19,096 s.f. and was a bargain at only $10,400,000.
Smallest House Sold
Our smallest house was also our least expensive house at 127 Henry St. As noted above, it sold for $515,000 and was only 768 s.f. Our next smallest house was in central Greenwich at 147 E. Elm St. It was only 1,024 s.f. but sold for $1,300,000. Anything close to town sells for a premium even if the lot is only 0.12 acres as it was here.
Inventory
- Lowest – 88 listings – 1st week of January – (2019 – 454 listings)
- Highest – 170 listings – 3rd week of Sept – (2019 – 630 listings)
Every week this year, we set a new record for lowest inventory of all time until June, when we barely eked above our very low 2023 inventory levels. We finished the year with 97 listings just above 2023’s year-end inventory of 93 listings. By the beginning of 2025 we once again slopped into record low inventory levels with only 86 single family homes on the market in Greenwich. There is not nearly enough inventory to meet demand.
Days on Market
When you are in a tight market, one thing that happens is that houses that have been sitting for a long time find buyers. This year we had 11 houses sell that had been on the market for more than 365 days. The highest DOM was 90 Oneida Drive selling after 1,210 days on market. The second longest days on market was 6 Windrose Way at 900 days on market. There is a good chance that other houses even exceeded this total, but they had been on and off the market so that days on market got reset.
Acres
Our largest lot size sold this year was 618 Lake Avenue at 12.3 acres. That’s a nice size, but it is indicative of how few great estates survive intact. At the other end of the lot size, our smallest lot sales were a tie at 0.07 acres at 24 Prospect St. and 127 Henry Street, our two most inexpensive houses. These lots were right at 3,000 s.f. This means that the lot size for these two houses was less than houses’ square footage 171 of our 500 houses sales house that sold last year; i.e. these lots were smaller than most people’s houses.
OLP vs SP
Our most over list price sale was at 52 Shore Road. It went for 59% over list price. It listed for $3,495,000 and sold for $5,500,000 in 28 days on market. Of our 500 sales so far this year, 289 went for full list price or over list price. At the other end 429 Round Hill Road went for only 56% of its original list price and took 608 days to get to contract.
All in all, an interesting year, and so far, 2025 is starting out even more interesting.
