Eastside weekly wrap-up: pending sales stay flat as buyers continue to wait
This week on the Eastside we saw new listings fall 15% week-over-week as moved into October. This is not surprising as most sellers will start getting the advise from their listing agents to wait until spring of 2023 and there are a lot of homes on the market right now for buyers to choose from – 1,144 active listings across the Eastside! 147 listings saw price reductions this past week and 688 have been on the market for more than 30 days.
For buyers, they continue to wait for any sign of rates improving (we ended the week at 7.12% for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage) or for the stock market to recover even slightly. Only 121 homes went under contract this past week, relatively flat week-over-week. Most of the buyers I’ve spoken with are staying very selective or on-hold through the end of the year which will be tough on sellers with active listings.
On the blog, we dug into the September monthly market reports. The big theme is falling home prices – single-family homes are down 29% since they peaked in March and condos are down 16% since peaking May. However, single-family home prices are still up 5% year-over-year while condo prices are relatively flat from September 2021. With pending sales down and listings increasing, Q4 will have opportunities for buyers and be tough for sellers – all subject to any positive movement in interest rates and the stock market.
Only a few listings caught the eye this week – a $3.7M NW contemporary in Mercer Island Estates and this $2.9M mid-century in Bellevue on a 1.1 acre lot! If that’s not enough space for you, check out this 5+ acre estate in the Issaquah Alps fully wired for solar with a move-in ready ADU.
