The number of closings of apartment sales in Manhattan decreased by 47.1 percent in the first quarter of 2009, from the 2,826 closings of last quarter, according to a new report by Streeteasy.com.

"Co-op resale closings have decreased by 40.3% since last quarter, while condo resales decreased by 39.6% and new developments dropped by 57.1%. New development closings made up 34.5% of the closings, while co-op resales dominated activity at 44.6%....Inventory of available units in Manhattan has steadily increased every week this

quarter, staying above 9,400, and peaking above 11,700 in late-March. According to our listings database, an average of 403 new listings came onto market every week in this quarter, an increase of 9.2% since last quarter where we saw an average of 369 new listings per week. Condos made up 52.1% of all available listings on market this quarter....Inventory level this quarter is 40% higher than they were a year ago," the report maintained.

Although the study indicated that there were only 107 broken contracts in the first quarter, a 24 percent decrease compared to the previous quarter, it noted that "37 percent of all Manhattan listings had price cuts....There were over 2,500 listings with

price cuts in available listings for condos, a 33.5% increase since last quarter but more than 1.6 times the number of cuts since last year. Co-ops had a 31% increase in the number of price cuts, to just about 3,100 listings. The average price cut this quarter for condos was 9.4%, and for co-ops, the average cut was 9.3%....The average time on market for condo resale listings increased by 24.1% since last quarter, while co-ops sat on the market for 8.1% longer than last quarter. This quarter, condo resales stayed on the market for an average of 137 days, while co-op resales were on the market for an average of 112 days."

The report is based on about 1,500 recorded sales for the first quarter as well as more than 1,000 brokerage sources.

"The average Manhattan sales price," it found, "increased by 0.7% to $1.435M since last quarter, but decreased by 12.1% since last year. Condo resale median price declined to $895K, a 4.7% decrease since last quarter and a 7.5% decrease since last year. Average price is down 7.6% for the quarter and 10.8% since last year. Co-op resale median price declined by 11.3% compared to last quarter and by 16.7% since last year. Average sales price declined by 17.1% since last quarter and by 25.8% since the prior year. New Developments median sales price continued to increase by 10.4% since last quarter to $1.275M and increased by 26.4% since last year. Average sales price also increased by 17.5% since last quarter, and by 7.4% since last year."

Chelsea and Midtown East had the most closings in the first quarter, 106 each, according to Streeteasy.com, while the most price cuts occupied in the Beekman neighborhood, 51.9 percent of the listings down an average of 9.55 percent, the Carnegie Hill neighborhood, 47.3 percent of the listings down an average of 10.41 percent, and SoHo, 45.6 percent of the listings down an average of 10.81 percent.

It reported that the "most searched" buildings at its website in the first quarter were, in descending order, Chelsea Stratus at 101 West 24th Street, 20 Pine Street, the Park Millennium at 111 West 67th Street, 200 West End Avenue and 25 Central Park West.

"Median sale price for townhouses declined by 57.3 percent since last quarter, and by 47.7 percent since last year. The volume of townhouse sales in Manhattan overall has declined by 40.6 percent since last quarter and by 75.9 percent since last year, with only 19 closings this quarter. Out of these 19 closings, 10 of them (52.3 percent) were in Upper Manhattan, which lowered the overall average and median prices," the report said.