…The first quarter Manhattan housing market was defined by the acute shortage of inventory. As with many US housing markets, inventory in Manhattan has been falling for several years; this quarter, listing inventory posted its steepest year-over-year drop in the 12 years we’ve been recording it, declining 34.4% from the prior year quarter to 4,960. This was the ninth consecutive month and the 14th of the last 15 months that has shown a year-over-year decline in inventory. Despite the drop, number of sales increased 6.3% to 2,457 as consumers fought tight credit conditions to take advantage of low mortgage rates, and more still were incentivized by the rise in rental prices over the past two years…