Hot, hot, hot—the temperatures keep rising in the real estate market, strongly favoring sellers. Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty examines five key markets each quarter to find out where the market has been, and where the trends might lead us next. And 2021 kicked off with a limited number of available homes. Across these single-family home market areas, a lack of inventory has, at least in part, contributed to escalating median home sales prices, which have increased between eight and 30 percent year-over-year. Sellers take heed: it’s likely still an optimal time to list a home for sale.
Seattle | Single-Family Homes
Competition among buyers? There’s plenty of it in Seattle, with fewer homes for sale year-over-year. The median home sales prices are rising, up over eight percent compared to this time last year, but the climbing rates inside the Emerald City are relatively subdued compared to other markets in the Puget Sound region, including those below.
Seattle | Condominiums
There’s plenty of optimism to be found in the Seattle Condo market, which compared to the other markets examined by RSIR for its quarterly reporting, has slower median home price growth, and significantly more days on market on average. Though it’s still a seller’s market and more homes sold in the first quarter of 2021 than did this time last year.
Eastside | Single-Family Homes
When comparing Q1-2021 to the first quarter a year ago, which includes pre-pandemic home sales, the median sales price for a single-family home skyrocketed 32 percent. A lack of inventory—0.5 months—is likely among the reasons we’re seeing over-list offers climb at such astronomical rates.
Bainbridge Island | Single-Family Homes
The number of homes sold on Bainbridge Island has increased year-over-year but not by a significant amount, 66 in 2020, 73 in 2021. Still, only .8 months of inventory is available, and the median home price for a single-family home on Bainbridge Island has risen by 16 percent.
Mercer Island | Single-Family Homes
The beautiful homes of Mercer Island are harder to find right now because the length of time they languish on market has nearly been eliminated. In 2019 and 2020 homes were on market for an average of 54 and 108 days respectively. In 2021 the average is 17. Meanwhile, the median sales price for an island abode has increased 18 percent year-over-year.
