Mike Rosenberg of Seattle Times has launched “an occasional column that aims to take you deeper inside our housing market” by answering frequently asked reader questions that involve all things in Seattle real estate. He decided to kick things off with a question on many Washingtonians minds: “Why exactly are home prices skyrocketing so quickly here?”
Read MoreThe US Census Bureau recently released new population statistics that reveal Seattle added just over 17,000 people to its population in 2017, which equates to about 326 people per week or 46 people per day. As Curbed Seattle reports, Seattleites aren’t likely to be surprised at the latest figures, which show “that around 724,745 people lived in the Seattle city limits alone as of July 2017.”
Read MoreAfter a few years of staggering rent increases, single-family home rental prices in Seattle are leveling off, which Seattle Times predicts could bring more and more landlords to decide to list their homes for sale and benefit potential homebuyers (and renters). As the article outlines, approximately 1 in 6 single-family homes in the greater Seattle region is currently rented, and the last couple of years have seen dramatic decreases in what was once a burgeoning market for landlords. While “rents in local single-family homes rose a paltry 0.4 percent in February from a year ago,” landlords saw 4% increases last year, and “just two years ago, rents were soaring as much as 9 percent annually.”
Read MoreThe headlines over the past few months in the greater Seattle region have often felt like “stale news,” with housing prices continuing to increase as inventory dwindled and demand rose. Yet homebuyers received some welcome good tidings last week, as the latest Northwest Multiple Listing Service press release revealed that the number of homes available for sale actually increased in May. Puget Sound Business Journal reported on the news, writing that “the four-county metro area had nearly 10,500 new listings in May, 1,000 more than the same month in 2017.”
Read MoreThere was good news for Seattle-area homebuyers in the latest Northwest Multiple Listing Service Press Release, as April 2018 data revealed a slight increase in inventory. In all, “Northwest MLS brokers added 11,271 new listings to inventory during April, a gain of 6.3 percent when compared to March; and up nearly 5.9 percent versus a year ago.” Despite more homes on the market, just 6 of the 23 counties covered reported year-over-year inventory gains, and “King County was the only one in the Puget Sound region to notch a gain, up 13.6 percent from a year ago.”
Read MoreIn a recent real estate column in Seattle Times, reporter Mike Rosenberg asked a question on many minds: “Why are Seattle-area home prices so high?” At the most basic level, it all boils down to two factors: supply and demand.
Read MoreThe Puget Sound region held the national spotlight recently, as two of our local neighborhoods ranked among Zillow’s top twenty in the country based on the number of listing page views in each area. And as Puget Sound Business Journal reports, Zillow Group also put together a list of the top ten neighborhoods around the Sound along with the median listing price. Do you think you know which areas were most popular among Zillow searchers?
Read MoreWith construction cranes at nearly every turn in downtown Seattle, it is easy for one to look around at all of the high-rises under development and assume they are condominiums. Yet, as Curbed Seattle reports, “the majority of new residential projects going up in the city—and downtown specifically—are destined to be rentals.” This means that out of the multi-family opportunities in the city, only 7.1 percent will be offered for sale. And this is a far-reaching figure, that covers “not just downtown proper, but lower Queen Anne, Belltown, Pioneer Square, Sodo, First Hill and western parts of Capitol Hill.”
Read MoreSeattle has now topped the nation in home price growth on the S&P/CoreLogic Case-Shiller Home Price Index for eighteen months in gains that are once again widening on a monthly basis. Despite slipping slightly last summer, February’s monthly increase exceeded January’s by 1.74 percent, representing an average price increase of 1% per month over the last twelve months.
Read MoreOver the next few years, the city of Seattle will transform its waterfront in an exciting project that will see updates extending from Pioneer Square through to Belltown’s Battery Street. As Waterfront Seattle describes, the changes will capitalize “on the opportunity created by the removal of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and the replacement of the Elliott Bay Seawall” and will include the new Elliott Bay Seawall (currently under construction), better connections between city neighborhoods, infrastructure updates, and twenty acres of public space.
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