This home is ready to move in, with an updated kitchen, new laminate floors, and a new vanity and counters in the bathroom. A large detached garage has room for two cars, with a location that's close to schools, shopping, and more.
Listed by Tammy Yao & James Melgard • Windermere Real Estate/East
This home's features include newly-finished hardwood floors, an inviting fireplace, living and dining rooms, a tiled kitchen with a breakfast nook, and a fully-tied bath.
Listed by Stephen Koon • Windermere R.E. Shoreline
This is a light-filled townhome in Maple Leaf, complete with large living spaces and a dining room with a gas fireplace. The spacious master suite offers two closets and a full bath, with new marble vanities and a tile floor. Plus, it's close to a future light rail station!
In their latest home price index report, Case-Shiller finds that year over year nationwide home prices rose 4% in February, the most recent month for which data was available. And though that's a drop from the month before (home prices rose 4.2% in January), it's not as steep a drop in home growth as Seattle, which grew 2.8% from a year ago.
That's a far-cry from Seattle's previous high, 12.7%, giving it the title for the city with the largest gains for more than a year. Only four cities had smaller gains in February: San Diego, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago.
And what's happening in Seattle seems to be in keeping with a shift nationwide.
"The pace of increases for home prices continues to slow," David M. Blitzer, managing director and chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said in the report. "The largest year-over-year price increase is 9.7% in Las Vegas; last year, the largest gain was 12.7% in Seattle. Regional patterns are shifting. The three California cities of Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego have the three slowest price increases over the last year.
Chicago, New York and Cleveland saw only slightly larger prices increases than California. Prices generally rose faster in inland cities than on either the coasts or the Great Lakes."
Which is not out of line with what other reports have found. In an October study by WalletHub, Seattle barely cracked the top 25 cities for jobs — specifically because although the city boasted the seventh most job openings on the list and second highest median salary, the city scored the second highest median home value. The survey found that though the coasts were the ones offering metropolitan and technology hubs, it was the midwest where the complete employment package could go the farthest.
Not all cool down is created equal though. Though Seattle saw a record decline by certain metrics — rapidly coming down from its hottest levels last year — the latest Northwest Multiple Listing Services report had numerous brokers who believe the market is settling into a more balanced version of what it was last year, which is to say, something of a springtime frenzy.
"After the housing adjustment in 2018, this year's spring market is back to frenzied in the more affordable and mid-price ranges," remarked J. Lennox Scott, chairman and CEO of John L. Scott Real Estate. "This improved affordability, along with lower interest rates and very strong job growth, all point us in the right direction for red-hot acceleration again this year."
So while Seattle's real estate may be growing at a similar rate to national prices, don't forget that it's still a pricey market to be in. The city's median sales price in March according to NWMLS was $752,500 — markedly down from March 2018's $859,000, but not exactly cheap.
That being said, there are still deals to be found. Click through the slideshow above to see some homes below the median sales price on sale in Seattle now. The prices start at $479,900.
