King County Real Estate Market Update | August 2024

Hey all, Zach McDonald, your real estate agent with Real Property Associates, and this is my King County real estate market update for August, 2024.

Welcome to the Heat of the Summer here in King County, and we’re seeing that prices are continuing to rise in King County, even in the middle of the summer. I’d argue that that is abnormal. It is not happening in Snohomish County, king County Sister County up north, but it is happening right now in King County. And King County is home to many of the region’s, most expensive places to live close into the city. Places like Bellevue, places like Seattle, places like Redmond or Kirkland, and I’m not going to name everywhere, but there are places in King County that are some of the most expensive places to live here in Washington. So if we look at the new listings here over the past month, we did see an increase year over year of about 19%, but also a decline from last month in June, about 300 fewer listings coming on the market.

We also saw that pending sales dipped a tiny bit from last month, which would make sense when we had fewer listings, but that we saw a 17.2% jump in pending sales. So the buyer and listing activity is keeping up at least for the most part. Right now. Days on market is up about three days here from last month, 17 days. Last month we were at 14 days, but down year over year. It’s typical in July and August to see the amount of days on market increase as usually there are more houses sitting on the market and the time it will increase as more options are there for buyers and there’s a little less pressure to buy within a week or so. And we’re seeing that with the inventory numbers too. So the inventory of homes for sale is up 29.6% in King County. We’re over 3000 houses available right now.

Last month we were just under the 3000 number. The supply number though, is kept about the same 2.1 months of supply, which is still low. But earlier in the year, we were hovering around one, just under one month of supply, less activity, less houses on the market. Now we’re seeing that those numbers are increasing. There’s a lot more listings, and that does take the pressure off of the prices, which is why we see that the percentage of asking price is decreasing. So in King County right now, 1.2% above asking price has been the average across King County over the past month. Last month it was at 2.2% above asking price. And as far as prices go, I mentioned right away that have been increasing. And last month in King County, we were at 9 97. For the median sales price that is just under $1 million and 10.8% above last year, last month we were at 9 75 for the median sales price.

And the average is just under 1.3 1,290,433, and that’s up 11.9% year over year. So as a perspective buyer, if you’re somebody thinking about buying in King County, each city’s going to be a little bit different. So if you have questions about specific areas, I’m happy to dialogue about that down in the comments or have a conversation. And same thing with selling, right? Each market is a little bit different, whether you’re in Redmond or Kenmore, maybe you’re over in Renton. It’s all going to be a little bit more market specific. But this should give you a general idea for what’s going on in the King County housing market right now. And as I think about where we’re headed, king County is one of the most desirable places for people to live in Washington. And it is mainly because of the jobs I would argue, and the natural beauty too.

I love King County for all of those things. Now, as we think about what the housing market might look like in the fall, typically we see that the inventory numbers come down. And as we look at what’s happening with mortgage interest rates, there is a lot of speculation that we’re going to start to see some cuts to the Fed rate and some reductions there. And also that mortgage rates would in turn start to come down a little bit. Again, not directly connected, but correlated for sure. And as we look at what the end of 2024 might look like, I think right now is kind of the prime buyer opportunity where prices are pretty transparent. You’re not paying a bunch over asking price. There are a lot more options, there is more supply. I think as we get towards the end of the fall and head into the winter, there will be very few options and potentially quite a few people getting back into the market more competition because of rates coming down. So a few thoughts as we wrap it up. If you have questions about your situation and want to talk that over with me, I’d love to be a resource. And as always, if this content has brought value to you, please subscribe and consider sharing with someone else.