Seattle Area Real Estate & Homes For Sale

Thank you for visiting the website of the Seattle Area Real Estate Team, your online source for information on buying or selling real estate in Seattle. Our site offers you a detailed and complete search of all listed properties to help you quickly find the best Seattle homes for sale.   We know and service the entire Seattle area real estate market and surrounding metro areas around Bellevue, Tacoma and Everett and all areas in between.  

Our goal is to provide you with professional, knowledgeable and dedicated representation with a focus on your desires and goals while making our association one that you will keep for life.   If you are interested in buying or selling property around Seattle let a member of our team of talented and professional real estate brokers meet with you to discuss your needs and goals and assist you with your next move. 

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SEATTLE AREA MARKET UPDATE Q1 -2022

The Seattle area real estate market as we enter the start of 2022 continues to have one of the most extraordinary situations ever seen in this area. A lack of inventory in 2019 which grew throughout 2020 and 2021 has stayed an absolute scarcity of supply of available properties in comparison to the current demand for them. 

2021’s housing market remained "very active" to "frenzied" around Washington state with brokers reporting year-over-year gains in new listings, closed sales, and prices. Brokers with Northwest Multiple Listing Service also finally detected growing stability in the condominium market.

A new report from Northwest MLS shows brokers added slightly more new listings last month (11,373) than a year ago (11,210). That volume, which includes single-family homes and condominiums, nearly matched the total for August (11,437), and barely outgained the number of pending sales (11,318) for the 26 counties in the report.

The number of mutually accepted offers in the Puget Sound region (King, Kitsap, Pierce and Snohomish counties) made last month the MLS' second-best September, based on records going back to 2003.

Low inventory continues to pose challenges for buyers.  As of the end of September, there was about three weeks of supply (0.75 months), slightly better than August (0.70 months), but less than the same month a year ago (0.89 months). There has not been more than one month of supply since July 2020 when it reached 1.04 months.

King County had the sharpest decline in inventory for single-family homes. The selection of only single-family homes plummeted from the year-ago volume of 2,420 to 1,634 (down 32.5%).

With inventory still below one month we expect that the last quarter of 2022 will continue the sharp rise in prices as we’ve seen over the past several years. While buyers will absorb the new higher interest rates (which may force some into lower price points), there still is simply not enough homes for sale to keep up with the market demand for them. These elements indicate that we will continue to have an active and competitive market which will continue until the supply issue is abated.

As to be expected in a market with an imbalance of supply vs. demand, prices continue to rise significantly. What makes this current market different from what happened in 2007-08 is that it is being pushed upwards by the lack of supply and not speculation or exotic loan products. Although it is a market driven by an extreme situation it is also one that is based upon solid metrics and not prone to a crash.  This is a highly active market that is beneficial for sellers, challenging for buyers and will require real estate brokers with the experience and talent to help them navigate through it to success.

ABOUT THE SEATTLE AREA

The Seattle metropolitan area is made up of three counties - King which encompasses the city of Seattle and spreads eastward; Snohomish county to the north and Pierce to the south.  Puget Sound forms the western border of the Seattle area and stretches 100 miles north and south and connects to the Pacific Ocean via the Straits of Juan de Fuca.  The region was formed by ancient glaciers which carved out the many waterways that are spread throughout the area.  To the east of Puget Sound rises the Cascade range of mountains and Mt. Rainier, the tallest and most prominent of the mountain chain.  The Seattle area and Puget Sound was first explored by George Vancouver in 1792, who claimed it for Great Britain and named the sound after his Lieutenant - Peter Puget.  The first non-native American settlers in the area started a town in present day Tumwater with the Seattle area adding its first in 1852.  Seattle was the main travel and trade port with Alaska and the rest of the United States and grew around a shipbuilding industry in its early years.  The Tacoma area south of Seattle had a significant smelting industry where copper, gold and silver were processed.  In the world war years the Seattle area developed a number of heavy industries with the Boeing company building airplanes and a number of companies building ships around Seattle and Tacoma.  The Boeing company maintains a large presence throughout the Seattle area to this day with multiple facilities in and around Seattle.  In recent years the Seattle area has expanded its growth around the technology industry with Microsoft and Amazon leading that new era. The Seattle area is the most populous part of Washington state with an estimated population of over 3.7 million.