Quiet deals are suddenly the loudest story in New York City real estate, as off-market residential sales surged in 2025 and spread from Manhattan’s trophy towers into the row houses and condos of Brooklyn and Queens. Brooklyn led the city in privately marketed dollar volume with roughly $5.4 billion in sales, while Queens racked up nearly 5,400 off-market deals, a 21 percent jump from 2024. The shift is changing where buyers actually find inventory and how brokers pitch would-be sellers across the boroughs.
Those trends come out of an analysis of 2024 and 2025 closings, according to The Real Deal, which reported that off-market volume climbed at least 30 percent year over year in Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens. The outlet cites Brown Harris Stevens spokesperson Ashley Brennan, who said, "People are now being feared into this thought pattern that if you list privately first, it will help the seller achieve a certain outcome." The Real Deal also notes that Compass has spent months promoting a private-listing strategy even as competing firms continue to criticize the tactic.
A brewing industry fight
Brokers and listing portals are now in a very public tug-of-war over who controls access to inventory and which properties get mass exposure. Industry leaders such as Brown Harris Stevens CEO Bess Freedman and Corcoran’s Pam Liebman have gone on record blasting the growth of private-listing networks, as reported by Inman. At the same time, Zillow has taken legal action to defend its Listing Access Standards after alleging that broker groups coordinated efforts to push private listings onto portal feeds, according to HousingWire.
Neighborhoods where it’s happening
The Real Deal’s neighborhood breakdown shows the steepest gains outside Manhattan’s traditional luxury core. East Williamsburg logged a 170 percent year-over-year spike in off-market volume, while Flushing posted the most off-market transactions overall with 374 closings, a 72 percent increase. Manhattan still dominates the priciest quiet trades, though. The Upper West Side led all city neighborhoods with about $551 million in off-market volume, followed by Lenox Hill and Lincoln Square. The analysis also cites Douglas Elliman’s Richard Ferrari, who suggests that commission structures in parts of the outer boroughs can nudge listing agents to sell directly or offer slim co-broke splits, which may speed up in-house deals.
What buyers and sellers should know
Private listings can give sellers a way to test pricing and keep a move under the radar, but they also shrink the buyer pool and blur price discovery, consumer guides point out. As BrickUnderground explains, off-market campaigns can work well for high-profile owners who value discretion, yet they may leave ordinary buyers at a disadvantage. Regulators and some brokerage leaders are already weighing potential limits meant to protect transparency in the marketplace, according to RISMedia.
For now, the off-market wave looks poised to keep rolling into neighborhoods that once depended on splashy public marketing, although pending lawsuits and policy efforts could reshape how visible these deals are to buyers and researchers. National reporting has flagged private listings as a major industry flashpoint, with big brokerages and portals battling over who gets to control inventory and data, per Bloomberg, and investors, buyers and sellers will be watching closely to see how the fight plays out.
