The average sales price in the Hamptons and in the nearby North Fork market plunged 36 percent from a year ago and 25 percent from the fourth quarter to $1.1 million in the first quarter, and the number of sales were down by half year-over-year, according to Prudential Douglas Elliman.
"We track bonuses pretty closely in the Hamptons," Hoffman said.
Fat bonuses whip up the market; skimpy ones flatten it.
Take one Southampton property: It offers 13,500 square feet on five beachfront acres, a pond out back, nine bedrooms, a "wine cellar/grotto" and a $20 million discount to $60 million from a previous price of $80 million, according to StreetEasy.com.
As of late May, another house was on the market for $2.6 million, which was down 40 percent from $4.4 million. And the price of a third was reduced 34 percent to just under $2 million.
