Good news: the median price for a home is the highest it has been since January ’09 and it’s the second month in a row that we’ve seen this number increase. The average price of a home has increased every month in 2009 and this month’s number was the highest it’s been all year long!
Once again, last month we had the best month for the number of home sales in 2009! April and May both had a record number of pending and closed sales for the year. In other news, the amount of new listings really spiked up in May – there were 7,097 new listings to hit the market in May, for a total of 20,261 re-sale home and condo listings in King County. Last month there were “just” 13,164 listings, so you can see that the Spring/Summer real estate market is here and buyers have an overwhelming selection of homes to choose from.When we compare May 2009 to May 2008, the average price of a home* in King County depreciated 16.75 percent, according to the NWMLS statistics. Compared with May of last year, the average price of a home decreased from $494,868 to $423,875 and the median price dropped from $399,950 to $351,500 for a decrease of 13.78 percent over May 2008. The average asking price for a resale home or condo in King County is $651,507, not including brand new homes.
Last month we saw another large number of homes receive offers and enter into escrow: 2,801! That is our best month of Pending sales since October 2008. Out of the 2,801 homes that received offers and went into escrow last month, the average time that the home was on the market was 80 days. At the end of May 2008, there were 16,435 active homes for sale in King County. By comparison, at the end of May 2009, there were 13,537 actively listed homes for sale in the MLS in King County, representing a 4.83 month supply of homes. What this means is if no more homes were listed, and homes continued to sell at the same rate, it would take just over six months before all of the active listings were sold. This is the lowest supply of homes we’ve seen in King County since I’ve been tracking this data, and this is a good thing for buyers and the market! If you regularly read my newsletter, you know that six months is considered an optimum balanced market. Anything over six months is considered to be a Buyer’s Market and a supply of less than six months is considered a Seller’s Market.
If you are thinking about buying, this is still an excellent time to get a great deal on a home! Interest rates are very low, the selection of homes is incredible, sellers are willing to negotiate, and home buyers can now purchase homes that would have cost an additional hundred thousand dollars or more a year or two ago! First-time home buyers also have an incredible opportunity to receive an $8,000 gift from the government, if they close by November 30, 2009. Certain restrictions apply – please see this blog post for more information.
*When reporting on homes in this update, the numbers represent only single family re-sale homes, townhouses & condominiums. All of the data used in this report does not include any brand new homes, manufactured homes or vacant land. All data comes from the NWMLS Statistics reports and all charts were created by and are the property of Stephanie Dawson.
Pierce County Update
More good news: Pierce County’s average home price is up from last month and it’s the first time we’ve had an increase in the average sale price in 2009! Have prices stopped falling? Have we reached the bottom? Oddly, the median price remained exactly the same in April and May ’09. We had 63 more sales in May over April’s number, and we had 42 more properties go into escrow in May over April’s number. How’s THAT for some good news for Sellers? Higher home prices and more sales!
When comparing May 2009 to May 2008, the average price of a home* in Pierce County depreciated 7.54 percent, according to the NWMLS statistics. More specifically, the average price fell from $293,118 to $252,431 and the median price fell from $259,739 to $225,000 for a decrease of 8.19 percent over May 2008. In Pierce County, the average asking price for a resale home or condo is $386,049 - and that doesn't include new homes that builders are trying to sell.
Out of the 1,196 homes that received offers and went into escrow last month, the average time that the home was on the market was 96 days. That’s the same number of days on market as last month.
In May 2008, there were 8,548 active homes for sale in Pierce County. At the end of May 2009, there were 7,926 active homes for sale in the MLS in Pierce County, representing a 6.63 month supply of homes. What that means is if no more homes were listed, and homes continued to sell at the same rate, it would take six months before all of the active listings were sold. This is the lowest supply of homes we’ve seen in Pierce County since I’ve been tracking this data, and this is a good thing for buyers and the market! If you read my newsletter regularly, you know that six months is considered an optimum balanced market. Anything over six months is considered to be a Buyer’s Market and a supply of less than six months is considered a Seller’s Market.
As I mentioned above, in the King County section - if you are thinking about buying, this is still an excellent time to get a great deal on a home! Interest rates are very low, the selection of homes is incredible, sellers are willing to negotiate, and home buyers can now purchase homes that would have cost an additional hundred thousand dollars or more a year or two ago! First-time home buyers also have an incredible opportunity to receive an $8,000 gift from the government, after they purchase their home. Certain restrictions apply – please see this blog post for more information.
*When reporting on homes in this update, the numbers represent only single family re-sale homes, townhouses & condominiums. All of the data used in this report does not include any brand new homes, manufactured homes or vacant land. All data comes from the NWMLS Statistics reports and all charts were created by and are the property of Stephanie Dawson.