Seattle Real Estate Market Update - Video Transcript

Greetings everyone. Aaron Janus here, from the JanusGroup at RE/MAX Integrity. Wanted to bring you a little market update for March 2019.

You know what I get asked more than why the hell I have a narwhal, many of them, in my office -- the question I get asked more than that is "How's the market? What's happening in the market?"

Let's take a look at what the Seattle Times has to say. This headline is from February 7th, which was just a month ago. SEATTLE AREA HOME PRICES DROP TO LOWEST POINT IN TWO YEARS - DOWN $116,000 SINCE LAST SPRING Another headline from the Seattle Times - this one from just a few days ago: MARKET TURNAROUND? KING COUNTY HOME PRICES TAKE BIGGEST ONE-MONTH JUMP EVER

So that's the news. That's what's in the news.

So - how's the market? First of all, a couple of things: the median home price does not equal my home's value. What it says on Zillow and other automated valuation models, does not equal my home's value. Are prices coming down? Is the trajectory of appreciation cooling down? Absolutely. But the market is still very strong.

I know how much everyone likes to talk about absorption rates. But I want to dig into this to give you some perspective. We've been on obviously quite a heater for five years now, and we've had very low inventory. A year ago, February, we had 0.6 months of inventory. So literally we had a couple of weeks worth of inventory on the market. That's incredibly low. So now we've about doubled the inventory that's out there right now, in terms of listings. Pending sales are off a little bit, but we're still at 1.6 months of inventory. This is across King County, and there are certainly some sub-markets across the county, but most of them, with the exception of Belltown and around Magnolia, most areas are still in the range of 1.5 to 2 months of inventory. The condo market has certainly cooled off a little bit more than the rest of the market. The fact of the matter is, we're still at 1.6 months of inventory. So while we have more inventory, and the number of buyers is down slightly, keep in mind, a balanced market is between three and six months of inventory. And we're at 1.6 months. It's still a very strong seller's market. To give you some more perspective, when you look at these stats from the bottom of the market in 2011 and 2012, some of these areas had 20 months, 24 months, two years worth of inventory. We're talking about 1.6. The sky is not falling.

I get asked a lot, is this a good time to buy? And it depends. It depends on what your situation is. I've got clients, a family that just relocated here from California, does it make sense for them to purchase something, even though things are cooling down a little bit? It certainly does, when compared to paying $3,000 or $4,000 a month in rent. It makes sense for them to buy. I've got several folks that are relocating out of the area. Does it make sense to sell? Well, yeah, what's the alternative? To hang onto a property? Unless you're going to turn it into a rental property, which we can talk about too, it makes sense to sell.

Now, on the other hand, I've had calls from people who want investment property, and they want a 10% cap rate. That's not going to happen in our area. So that's not a good choice for them to purchase in this area, an investment property. At the end of the day, it depends on what your situation is, whether it makes sense or not. All in all, the market's pretty good.

If you have any questions at all, please give me a call. I'd love to take care of you and any referrals you have. I'm happy to talk about the market.

Thank you and we'll see you next month. Cheers.