Data from the fourth quarter of 2018 is in and Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty has analyzed the numbers. Take a look at the latest housing market trends in Seattle for single-family homes and condominiums.
San Francisco Nips at Seattle’s Heels in Latest Case Shiller Index Results
November 2017 was Seattle’s 15th month leading the nation on the S&P/Case-Shiller’s Home Price Index, the nation’s pre-eminent measure of single-family home prices.
Having briefly subsided from September into October, residential prices in Seattle resumed their upward trek, with the index turning positive by 0.18% in November. The official report from Case Shiller noted that “Seattle, Las Vegas, and San Francisco reported the highest year-over-year gains among the 20 cities. In November, Seattle led the way with a 12.7% year-over-year price increase, followed by Las Vegas with a 10.6% increase, and San Francisco with a 9.1% increase.”
Market Watch Q3 2016 – Downtown Seattle Condominiums
The in-city housing market in our Emerald City has a split personality. Buy or rent, the message is the same – it’s going to cost more and more to live here. This fact is reigniting the debate between renting and homeownership and developers are listening.
Downtown Seattle is a very robust rental market, which has welcomed more than 12,500 new construction units since 2011. Despite this massive increase in supply, economist Brian O’Connor says rents have still grown by more than 40-percent over this term due to an imbalance with supply and demand. According to Zumper, Seattle is now in the top ten most expensive rental markets in the nation with a median price of $1,800 per month (half are more, half are less) for one-bedroom apartments. Average rents of newer apartment towers downtown can demand $3.50 to $4.25 per square foot, per month. So a 600 sq. ft. one bedroom could easily cost a renter $2,100 to more than $2,500 per month. That kind of monthly payment could service a healthy mortgage. Recently, Zillow stated that 22-percent of Seattle’s renters can afford to buy. They have the incomes and credit scores to own, so why don’t they?
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What a Difference A Year Makes: Downtown Seattle Condominium Market Values Swell 28% in 2016
Eager homebuyers rallied during the first half of 2016 increasing unit absorption and median home prices by 48% and 28%, respectively according to analysis of Northwest Multiple Listing Service data released as of June 30th. The typical condominium is selling in just over a month with a median home value of $575,000. However, a closer look reveals that 135 of the 381 condominium closings so far this year were in the INSIGNIA condominium tower, a new construction development (and one remaining developer-owned unit in the Four Seasons Private Residences) whereas there were effectively no new construction deliveries or closings during the same term in 2015. When removing this spike of higher-priced, new inventory in the overall resale market still expanded by 22% year-over-year but total resale closings actually decreased 5% with 246 homes in 2016 (including a few resales at INSIGNIA) against closings of 258 units in the first half of 2015.
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Neighborhood Market Spotlight: Southeast Seattle
Southeast Seattle includes the neighborhoods of Mt. Baker, Seward Park, Leschi, Columbia City, Lakewood, and Rainier Beach. This is an historic area of Seattle, and some of its oldest streets (e.g., Holgate, Lander, Wilson, Angeline, and Graham) are named for early settlers and denizens of the city. The area has been a seller’s market continuously for the past three years, and has not seen more than six weeks of homes in inventory for sale since February 2015. The average monthly supply was 1.2 months in 2015, down from 1.9 months in 2014, and two months in 2013.
Neighborhood Market Spotlight: West Seattle
The West Seattle area of the city of Seattle includes the neighborhoods of Alki, Admiral, North Admiral, Belvedere, Fauntleroy, and Gatewood. Local media reports in 2015 indicated that West Seattle, especially its northern and western neighborhoods, have been a preferred target for homebuyers moving from California’s Bay Area. Chief Sealth High School in West Seattle is ranked among the top public high schools in the state. Although the area has been a seller’s market for years, the monthly supply tightened markedly in 2015, bottoming at 19 days in June. The average monthly supply was 1.8, from 1.7 in 2014 and about a month the previous year.
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Neighborhood Market Spotlight: Queen Anne & Magnolia
The Queen Anne/Magnolia area of Seattle comprises these two areas as well as a western portion of South Lake Union, near Amazon’s campus. Magnolia is the site of Discovery Park and The Homes at Fort Lawton, a community of restored homes offered by Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty. This area includes The Center School, one of the top-rated public high schools in Washington. It also includes the Seattle waterfront northwest of Belltown, where F5 Networks’ headquarters are located.
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Neighborhood Market Spotlight: Central Seattle
Central Seattle includes, among many others, the communities of Broadmoor, Capitol Hill, Denny Blaine, Madrona, and Washington Park. The Washington Park Arboretum is one of the world renown institutions in this area. Garfield High School, the state’s 12th ranked public high school is located here.29 There are over a dozen SEVP schools in this area, including the Northwest School just blocks from downtown, Seattle Preparatory School overlooking Portage Bay, Holy Names Academy in Stevens, and The Bush School on the north side of Harrison Ridge.30 Three of the nation’s leading hospitals are proximate—Virginia Mason, Harborview, and Swedish Medical Center—and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center is at South Lake Union. Though not in this area, the Amazon campus is very close by.
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Market Spotlight: Belltown & Downtown Seattle
Belltown is named for William Nathaniel Bell, one of the original settlers whose heavily forested land became downtown Seattle. The Belltown/Downtown area is where many Seattle landmarks like Pike Place Market and Smith Tower are found. Fortune 500 companies Nordstrom and Expeditors International are headquartered here. Among the many ongoing projects downtown, work began in June 2015 to lay the foundation for Weyerhaeuser’s new headquarters in Pioneer Square, to be opened in 2016; and the Pioneer Building on First Avenue has been purchased for redevelopment as co-working space and suites for small businesses and entrepreneurs. The pioneers’ clapboard houses are long gone and virtually all recorded sales are now of mid-rise and high-rise condominiums in this vibrant, 21st century city.
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Introducing The Market Report: Puget Sound Real Estate Trends & 2015 Year In Review
We are proud to present the Market Report: Puget Sound Real Estate Trends & 2015 Year in Review, a comprehensive look at the 2015 real estate market in an exploration of seven key counties of Western Washington: King, Snohomish, Kitsap, Pierce, Jefferson and Island counties, as well as 29 neighborhoods for our current and prospective clients. The report touches on macroeconomic trends, the primary demand drivers influencing our regional real estate market in addition to micro markets that vary greatly from neighborhood to neighborhood.
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