December saw slowing home sales, rising prices - seattlepi.com

With few homes on the market in the Seattle area in December, sales slowed and prices rose, according to a new report.

Pending sales, which don't all close but can be the latest indicator of recent activity, fell 9.3 percent in Seattle and 0.2 percent in King County from December 2011, the Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Monday. But closed sales were up 8.2 percent in the city and 18 percent countywide.

One reason for the decrease in pending sales is that sales had started to pick up last December, said Glenn Crellin, associate director of the Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies at the University of Washington.

Another may be the dearth of homes for sale, he said. "It could be that the potential buyers aren't finding anything they like."

And, unlike during the bubble years, he said: "This time they're not willing to jump in and buy anything that's on the market in their price range."

Seattle and King County respectively had 1.6 and 1.7 months' worth of homes on the market at the current sales pace in December, down from 3.3 and 4 months of supply a year earlier.

This is "almost nonexistent inventory," Crellin said. "That's just nothing out there."

The median price of house that sold in December was $420,540 in Seattle and $380,046 countywide, up 12.1 percent and 18.8 percent, respectively, from a year earlier. The medians were down 1 percent and 1.3 percent, respectively, from November (in line with typical seasonal variation).

The median condo price was $285,000 in the city and $206,000 countywide. That was up 21.8 percent and 11.35 percent, respectively, from a year earlier and 16.6 percent and 0.7 percent from November.

The market won't change this year, John L. Scott Real Estate Chairman and CEO J. Lennox Scott predicted in a listing service news release. "Historically low interest rates, healthy job growth, a shortage of homes for sale in many areas and price ranges, strong sales activity from both local home buyers and residential investors are creating multiple offers and price increases in areas with inventory shortages."

Crellin expects more homes to hit the market in coming weeks, with the holidays passed and rising prices allowing more people to sell for something close to what they paid.

But Washington, D.C., could still upend the market by deadlocking over such matters as raising the debt ceiling, he said. "We still have the federal financial issues that are going to have to be dealt with."

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Source: http://www.seattlepi.com/realestate/article/December-saw-slowing-home-sales-rising-prices-4172675.php

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