Siena survey: New Yorkers find real-estate market ‘strongly positive’

New York state consumers’ view of the real-estate market is “strongly positive” for the second straight quarter, and the expectation is that this market is “here to stay.”

That’s according to Donald Levy, director of the Siena (College) Research Institute (SRI), which released its latest survey report of consumer real-estate sentiment in the Empire State on Wednesday.

SRI’s numbers indicate that real estate is squarely in the “thriving zone” in which consumers see steady growth in real-estate values and both buyers and sellers are coming out ahead today and tomorrow, Levy said in the release.

“The advantage that buyers held over sellers is now gone. We have reached the point where statewide, New Yorkers see real estate as a win-win,” he said.

 The overall current real-estate sentiment score among New Yorkers in the third quarter of 2013 is 17.7, up 4.2 points from last quarter, according to the SRI data.

The figure is also above the point where equal percentages of citizens feel optimistic and pessimistic about the housing market.

Looking forward, the overall future real-estate sentiment score is 24.8, down from 29.6 last quarter, SRI said.

The sentiment figure also indicates New Yorkers expect the overall real-estate market and the value of property to increase over the next year.

Consumers also see the present as an improved time to sell with a score above breakeven at 12.2, up 5 points from last quarter, according to SRI.

At the same time, they also see it as a very good time to buy with a positive score of 12.5, the survey found.

The overall current real-estate sentiment score among upstate New Yorkers in the third quarter is 19.4, up 1.1 points from last quarter. The overall future real-estate sentiment score is 16.9, down 9.2 points from the second quarter.

A sentiment score of zero (0) in any category reflects a breakeven point at which the survey measured equal levels of optimism and pessimism among the population relative to the overall market, or buying or selling real estate, according to SRI.

Scores can range from an absolute low of -100 to a high of 100, but scores below -50 or above +50 are both rare and extreme, SRI said.

SRI conducted the survey of consumer real-estate sentiment throughout July, August, and September by random telephone calls to 2,175 New York state residents age 18 or older. As the sentiment scores are developed through a series of calculations, “margin of error” does not apply, SRI says.