Trump Tower Owners Are Dropping Prices

In the heart of Manhattan, Trump Tower apartment owners are slashing prices amid a broader cooling in New York City’s real estate market.

Eight of 13 million-dollar listings have seen reductions, signaling a shift in the high-end property market where price resilience has traditionally been the norm.

In a challenging real estate environment, Trump Tower may be an example of New York City’s fluctuating housing dynamics. Owners in the building are cutting prices on a range of apartments, with decreases up to 9.2 percent, reflecting broader market pressures and possibly a shift in luxury real estate’s perceived value.

The trend comes against a backdrop of a slightly recovering citywide median sales price and an inventory at its lowest in seven years, according to a report issued in March by the New York City Comptroller.

Shifts in prices at the 58-story tower in the Midtown East neighborhood of Manhattan offer a granular view of the city’s market dynamics. According to Zillow, the real estate marketplace, the eight apartments that saw price reductions ranged from 3.3 percent to 9.2 percent.

Particularly striking is an apartment now listed with a 30.3 percent reduction, which, after being delisted in 2016 at $3.3 million, reappeared on the market this March at $2.3 million—a reflection of both time and market shifts over eight years.

The adjustments reflect a cautious, if not bearish, sentiment among sellers, keen to attract buyers in a competitive and uncertain market. For instance, an apartment once listed at $1,649,000 saw its price reduced by 3.3 percent to more closely align with current market conditions, while another, initially offered at $7,700,000, adjusted downward by 9.2 percent, indicating that homeowners are recalibrating even at the higher end of the market.

Amid still-high interest rates and an overall cooling housing market, the price adjustments at Trump Tower may signal a new phase of market realism among luxury property sellers, according to the Comptroller report.

The report found that the city’s median sales price has seen relatively minor fluctuations, with a slight decrease from a record high of $782,000 in 2022 to $764,000 in 2023, before inching back up to $785,000 earlier this year.

A key factor constraining the city’s housing market is the dwindling inventory of available homes, the Comptroller said, now at a seven-year low. It’s a scarcity that is partly attributed to the “lock-in” effect, where homeowners, benefiting from historically low mortgage rates obtained during the past two years, are hesitant to sell.

The reluctance stems from an unwillingness to give up favorable mortgage rates and perceptions of lower selling prices in the current market, which the report said further exacerbates the supply shortage.

However, at the same time, those high mortgage rates and the overall market’s cooling effects are forcing sellers to adjust expectations, signaling a shift towards a more buyer-friendly environment in segments of the market—like luxury—previously insulated from broader economic pressures.