Seattle Real Estate Market Update | December 2017
The seasonal, holiday slowdown is about to end. Expect Seattle area home prices to start climbing again after the new year. The Seattle Real Estate Market is about to take off!
[Video Transcript]
Hey, all, Zach McDonald, your real estate agent, with Real Property Associates. This is my December monthly market update. I decided to go with green and red to coordinate for the Christmas colors. I do want to wish everybody who’s watching this a Merry Christmas and a happy holidays, whatever you’re celebrating this season.
Let’s talk a little bit about the market in Seattle right now. Rather than getting into specific numbers, they’re all pretty much the same as they’ve been all year. What I want to do is kind of talk more about what I think’s going to be coming up and give you a little sneak peek into my predictions for 2018.
The gist, this month, again, the Seattle median sales price, 729, and the surrounding suburbs are all up. We’re looking at somewhere between 15 to 20% over last year the same time. The year over the year … That’s the year over year number, the by month, so if you take the 12-month average from last year at this time til now, in the city of Seattle, about 14%. We’re very similar numbers in Shoreline, Edmonds, Lynnwood. Again, numbers are continuing to head upwards.
The biggest thing right now is inventory. I think this is going to continue to drive the real estate market in 2018. Inventory is extremely low, just like it was last year, but even a little lower this time of year. Inventory is seasonally low this time of year, so we’re even lower than the low inventory we’ve been experiencing. I expect December to be similar, inventory to remain low. But what I think is interesting is October, November was slower and I experienced this with a few of my listings and with the buyers I was working with, some of my buyers were able to actually get houses below the asking price. But what we’ve seen these last few weeks is the competition is picking up again. I had one buyer that is under contract right now and there were four offers on the house and they got it, and then another buyer this last week … excuse me … that is now under contract, and there were 11 other offers on the house. These are both in the suburbs areas that were a little bit slower a few months ago.
We’re starting to see that the buyer interest is picking up, inventory is still really low, but the buyer interest is picking up again. What I think coming into the year, and we’ll get more into this, is we’re going to continue to see an upward trend. Right now, prices are pretty leveled out. If you’re a buyer, this is the time to buy, it’s still a good time. We have a few more months, I think. You get a few more months where the prices are going to be pretty similar to what they’ve been the last five to six months. I think if you wait until April, May, you’re going to see those prices balloon up again, just like they have over the last few years. Again, I’ll get more specifically into that here in the coming weeks when I do my predictions.
Now, sellers, last month they talked about how maybe holding on was the better strategy. What’s interesting, I was looking at the numbers again here this month, and the price-per-square-foot and the sales price is almost the same as it was in June right now. Now, I do think it’s going to go up come April, May, so if you can hold out, definitely do. But if you need to sell in the next month or two, you’re going to be in a great position still because the buyer pool is starting to pick up. The people that aren’t procrastinators on their goals for 2018 are already thinking about buying a house, so they’re starting the ball rolling and I have clients in this position that are thinking, “Okay. I want to get set up for success.” Putting your home on the market here, maybe after Christmas, beginning of January, that’s, I think, that’s what I’m advising my sellers right now that want to sell in the next few months. That’s going to be your sweet spot, kind of early to middle January when all the buyers are done with the holidays, kind of ready to get started with their home search.
Now, this is kind of the turning point, I think, of the year. You’ve got a good time to buy still, and, coming up here after Christmas, good time to sell. I think we’re going to see, again, in February, so this is going to look back at January, just like we did last year, I think February we see those prices eclipse what they were last June. That’s my early prediction before we get into the full year prediction. But wanted to get this out to you.
Again, have a Merry Christmas, happy holidays, and we’ll see you next month. Bye for now.
