Eastside weekly wrap-up: second busiest week for new listings this year

It was the second busiest week of the year for new listings on the Eastside (similar to Seattle). 210 sellers got their homes listed (69% increase week-over-week), which was good news for buyers. Good news for everyone is that rates dropped below 7% at the end of the week, ending around 6.90%. We’ll see how long that lasts but hopefully they continue dipping for a little while – buyers could use a break!

Speaking of buyers, they were predictably quiet this week given the slow holiday weekend. Only 114 homes (down 34% week-over-week) went under contract as buyers navigated a low volume of listings and higher mortgage rates. I’m expecting higher activity this week due to more inventory.

What will the rest of the summer look like? Usually the market slows down after 4th of July weekend as everyone turns to enjoy summer. Given the pent up buyer demand due to inventory and rates, we’re expecting the slow-down to be less pronounced than previous years. However, it’s still tough to predict this market as around 20% of homes are selling in a week or two and others are sitting on the market for a lot longer, typically if they’re priced too high for this market.

Speaking of prices, Seattle Times reported that property assessed values will drop in most of King County for the first time in 15 years. “In Sammamish, values are down 22% on average, after shooting up 50% last year. This year’s property values help determine next year’s tax bills.” However, they wanted to be clear that this drop won’t correlate directly to savings on your tax bill. About 40% of your tax bill is from local voter-approved levies which is why property taxes don’t rise and fall exactly with the market value.

Despite all the new listings, really only this new construction in Clyde Hill caught our eye this week but we were surprised to see a penthouse unit listed for rent at $25,000/month in a new condo building in Bellevue as they haven’t publicly sold a unit yet!

P.S. Our next home-buying class is June 6! RSVP here.