Investors Not As Encouraged With Home Flipping As Television

Fixer Upper. Flip This House. Flip or Flop.

With the superfluous demand for television shows exposing the business of house flipping, it comes as a surprise that in the "real world" the demand is not there. In the past year there has been an overwhelming decline in the number of home flips across the country, with only 3.7 percent of home sales nationwide being flips, compared to the 6.5 percent in 2013.

New York City suffered even greater than the rest of the country, according to RealtyTrac, with an 8.73 percent decrease from 1Q 2013 to 1Q 2014 of home sales throughout the city being flips. The Real Deal attributes the heavy decline to the rise in Manhattan apartment prices, which has deterred investors from putting up a steeper than usual upfront cost.

However, given the sheer number of new developments across Manhattan announced within this same amount of time, it could be that investors are less inclined to buy and renovate when they could buy in a new development as an investment property. With such high end finishes and amenities in these new developments, for a home flip in New York to compare could be a tough sell.

Regardless of the new developments, owners are still renovating for resells -- there is a new high standard for apartments in Manhattan which means buyers want to be impressed. Since a flip is defined as a home that is purchased and resold within six months, if we take into account the improvements and work put into an apartment for sale outside of that defined time window, then a light is shed on the true importance of getting the right quality for what you buy.