Case-Shiller: Seattle Home Prices Hit a New Low in December

It’s time for our monthly check-in of the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices (HPI). The Case-Shiller data is generally considered to be the most reliable measure of overall home price changes for a region, since they only consider repeat sales of homes when calculating their index, instead of looking at all the homes that sold in a given month.

For the full source data behind this post, hit the S&P/Case-Shiller website. For a more detailed explanation of how the Case-Shiller Home Price Index is calculated, check out their methodology pdf. Also remember that the data released on the last Tuesday of a given month is for the period two months prior (i.e. – December data is released in February).

Here are the basic Case-Shiller stats for the Seattle area* as of December:

Ninteen of the twenty metro areas tracked by Case-Shiller saw a decrease in their HPI between November and December (the same as October to November). Washington DC’s 0.4% increase was the only month-to-month gain. In November there were four markets posting year-over-year gains. In December that number dropped to two: San Diego and Washington DC.

Here’s a look at the latest local tiered data, back through 2000:

And here’s a closer look at the recent changes, with the vertical and horizontal axes zoomed in to show just the last year:

All three tiers lost a fairly large amount of ground in December, but the high tier got especially hammered. Month to month, the low tier was down 1.8%, the middle tier fell 1.5%, and the high tier decreased 2.5%.

Read the rest of this entry »

Gallery Condo Auction Set For March 5th

UPDATE: The Gallery just announced this morning (Friday, March 4) that they’re cancelling the auction and changing the format to a “Buy Now One Day Sales Event.”  

Click here for the full details including the email Gallery sent to our agents this morning.  

If you’re still interested in purchasing one of these units and haven’t gotten in touch, just give our Downtown team a call at 206-659-1708.

Gallery, located at Second and Broad in Belltown, is the latest of Seattle’s condo developments to hold an auction. Twenty five residences will be auctioned off on Saturday, March 5 at 5 p.m., at the Grand Hyatt at 721 Pine Street, Seattle, 98101. Doors will open at 4 p.m.

Here are the details on Gallery:

• Located at 2911 2nd Ave
• 25 residences up for auction (24- Open 1b/1b, one- 1b/1b + Den)
• Minimum bids starting at $175,000 for a 571 square foot Open 1bed, 1 bath up to $295,000 for a 883 square foot 1 bed, 1 bath with den

Buy at Auction with Redfin’s Help

Interested in buying but unsure about the auction process? Need someone to help you from start to finish?

Redfin Seattle agents Bryon Ziegler and Earnest Watts both have extensive experience with helping clients buy at auction and would happy to answer any questions you have.

Bryon or Earnest Can:

• Set up a tour of Gallery
• Give advice prior to the bidding process and be there for the signing of the purchase and sale agreement (if you win)
• Guide you through the closing process

Bryon and Earnest will be at the auction, but please contact them ahead of time if you’re interested.

How to Get Started

Just give Redfin’s downtown team a call at 206-659-1708 or send us an email and tell us you’d like to tour Gallery. We’ll help you get it all set up. A Redfin agent must accompany you on the first tour to Gallery if you want us to represent you as the buyer’s agent at the auction.

You’ll also still be eligible for Redfin’s refund since Redfin will receive a 2% broker referral fee, of which we will refund up to 50% to you. Keep in mind that we do have a $6,000 minimum fee so if the final purchase price is below $300,000 you won’t receive a refund but will still receive great representation.

To be eligible for the Redfin refund, you do need to indicate you are represented by Redfin on your Auction Registration Form. If you want Redfin to represent you, the deadline for this registration is March 2nd.

To Participate in the Auction, Each Buyer Must:

• Prequalify with either MetLife Home Loans or Cobalt Mortgage
• Register in advance of auction, and make sure to have Redfin agent accompany you to your first tour of Gallery
• On auction day bring a cashiers check payable to yourself for $2,500. Also bring a blank personal check in case of a winning bid to pay the 3% minimum down payment (less a $2,500 earnest money check)

Other Auction Information

• Gallery auction site: auctionthegallery.com
• Results from previous Seattle area condo auctions:
  o Olive 8 auction results
  o Lumen auction results
  o Queen Anne High auction results
  o Brix and Gallery auction results

A Tale of Two Cities (January 2011 Insider Report)

Redfin’s monthly Seattle real estate insider report draws from our proprietary database of information on homes for sale and that just sold, along with insight from our agents to get a sense of what’s going on in the market right now. If you’d like to receive the report via email, just sign up.

Greetings Redfinnians!

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times… it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us.”

The opening line of Charles Dickens’ famous novel is a fitting description of the Seattle-area real estate market in January. Low prices are a buyer’s dream, but a seller’s nightmare. Inventory is still near record highs, but according to buyers, “there’s nothing out there.”

These are certainly interesting times to be buying or selling a home. Read on to find out the ins and outs of what happened in the local market in January.

Where’s the Beef…Er, I Mean the Inventory?

For buyers coming out of post-holiday hibernation, January’s inventory proved to be somewhat disappointing. Bucking the usual seasonal trend of an increase in new listings with the new year, the number of homes on the market fell across most of the Seattle region in January.

Change in # of King County Houses for Sale on January 31st 2011, By City

January’s selection was particularly poor on the Eastside. Bellevue’s inventory was nearly fifteen percent lower than a year ago, and Kirkland was down twelve percent.

“The number one complaint I hear from my buyers today is ‘there’s nothing out there,’” said Loren Ellingson, a Redfin agent in Bellevue. “We’re all holding out, waiting and praying for more inventory in March.”

Kirkland Redfin agent Kathryn Rion agreed. “I have a lot of buyers who are really ready to go, but most of what’s out there is either overpriced or really yucky,” explained Kathryn.

Sales Still Slow as Buyers Wait on Selection

Sales were down from a month ago and a year ago pretty much everywhere you looked around Seattle in January. From what our agents are seeing, this is due at least partly to the fact that there just aren’t a lot of homes out there that buyers can get excited about.

Change in # of King County Houses That Sold in January 2011, By City

Although sales have been slow to pick up in 2011, there is some action beginning to slowly build.

“We have buyers who have been searching with us since July or August who are finally finding the perfect home and pulling the trigger,” said Trevor Smith, a Redfin agent in Ballard. “It feels like spring has come early in Ballard. Inventory is growing as sellers seem to be listing earlier, and we’re seeing a steady stream of buyers coming into the market.”

Despite the low overall sales volume on the Eastside, buyers there are encountering some frustrating situations. Loren and Kathryn are both beginning to see banks get a lot more aggressive with their listings, putting well-kept REO homes on the market at far below market value, often generating over a dozen offers (no joke!).

“When a nice bank-owned home hits the market in Bellevue, it inevitably gets a lot of offers,” said Loren. “Many of these listings are generating so much interest that the banks cut things off after receiving ten offers.”

Falling Prices Tempt Buyers

Across most of the Seattle area, prices continued to slide. In King County, the median price fell 7.3% from December, and 6.1% from January 2010, while the size-adjusted median was down 1.5% from December and 6.1% from January 2010. The most notable exception to this trend was in Bellevue, where although the median price is down double digits, the size of homes sold is increasing dramatically, pushing the size-adjusted median price up.

Change in Median Price of King County Houses That Sold in January 2011, By City

“Some of my buyers see today’s falling prices and get a little ahead of the market,” said Kathryn. “They’re concerned about losing their down payment to continued depreciation, so they want to make offers well under list price. Sellers may end up accepting a significant discount from their original list price, but it can take time for a listing to season.”

Want to know what’s happening in your neighborhood? Download our comprehensive spreadsheet and dig into the data for yourself! Inside you’ll find county, city, and neighborhood information galore. To learn more about how we calculate these numbers, check out our methodology page. You can also liven up the place by posting a comment below.

The Top Three Buyer’s Agents in King County Work for Redfin

Redfin Seattle agents took seven of the top ten spots for King & Snohomish counties in October, November, & December 2010! Of the 4,000+ buyers’ agents who closed a deal in the fourth quarter of 2010, nineteen of our agents were ranked.

These numbers come from the NWMLS, which tracks real estate transactions in Washington State. We ranked buyers’ agents in King & Snohomish Counties first by number of purchases of single-family homes and condominiums in October, November, & December then by total dollar amount.

Twelve more of our Seattle-area agents closed deals in the past three months:

When you work with Redfin, you get great customer service while working with some of the most successful and active agents in the region.

Most agents spend around 80% of their time finding new clients, but Redfin agents don’t need to prospect since folks come to us on Redfin.com. As a result, Redfin agents can spend all their time serving clients: answering questions, hosting home tours, writing and negotiating offers, and listing homes. Redfin agents are experts in today’s market because they spend more of their time serving clients, not making sales calls.

Our Clients Love Our Service

We survey every client and track every transaction in a central customer database. For the surveys we received in October, November, & December from our clients in the Seattle area:

• 178 clients responded to our customer-satisfaction survey and posted a review online
• 172 of those clients, or 96%, would recommend Redfin to a friend

We ask customers to rate the likelihood that they would recommend Redfin to a friend on a 0-to-10 scale. Customers who rated 6 or higher count as people who would recommend Redfin to a friend. To learn more about how we survey our clients and calculate the customer ratings, check out our FAQ on agent reviews.

*These numbers do not include deals never listed on the MLS