Danny Greco 11/20/25 Danny Greco 11/20/25

Challenges with HOA's when buying/selling. The Seattle Condo Market Update, November 2025

Welcome to the latest and greatest edition of the Seattle Condo Market Update. As always, to jump straight into the stats, you can do so by clicking here. For those looking for more (and better) info, continue below!

As I've mentioned in previous reports, I struggle to find material for this report each month as the condo market has been so bland all year long. In this report, I thought I'd mix it up a little bit and discuss a variety of topics crucial to selling a condo in today's market. Bear with me.

Financial strength of HOA: Especially in markets like we're in right now, the financial health of an HOA is crucial in determining the marketability of a unit. What we're seeing right now is that there are lots of associations playing "catch up" because their dues have either been too low for too long, and/or for too long they've kicked capital improvement plans down the line. And while the rise in insurance premiums and taxes has caught every association off guard, those associations playing catch up have been disproportionately impacted. A great individual unit might warrant sufficient buyer interest, but that interest can completely evaporate if the association's financial health is poor.

Rules and Regs: Additionally, associations can deter buyers for reasons outside of their financial weakness. I'm referring to restrictive rules and regulations, specifically those that are restrictive in their pet and rental policy.

Seattleites love their dogs. Associations that don't allow dogs, expect a more difficult time in selling that unit and more time on the market. Associations that have weight policies on pets (25lbs and less) can also make it difficult, but at least offer something for dog owners. Cats seem to be acceptable everywhere. Pretty unanimously, most projects will have a 2 pet maximum. There's lots of variety when it comes to pets, just remember being excessively restrictive on dogs is not helpful in selling quickly.

Restrictive rental policies can also deter buyers. Generally homeowners like the flexibility of having the option to rent out their home if they move out, but aren't wanting to sell. Except, if the building has a restrictive rental cap policy in place, this can leave a homeowner in a real pickle. To be fair, I'm not aware or any condo building that doesn't have a rental cap policy in place so they're all restrictive to some degree. Most associations have a 25%-50% cap meaning no more than 25% or 50% of total units can be rented at one time. Some of the more challenging associations will have caps at 10% and it's not uncommon to hear of wait lists where there are homeowners waiting to rent out their unit when an opening becomes available. Imagine buying a unit in a low rental cap association and you get an unexpected job change. You can sell, but the market is really unfavorable, but you also can't rent the unit because there's a waiting list. What do you do? This is a real situation for many homeowners, unfortunately.

Non-warrantable: This is the term used to describe a condo association ineligible for conventional financing. In other words, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac won't back any mortgages for these associations (of course, that means neither will the VA or FHA). Associations become non-warrantable for a variety of reasons. It could be financial (low reserves, special assessments in place or on the way) or something else like more than 50% of the units being rented, a single person owning more than 10% of the total units, the association being involved in litigation, etc.

The only options for owners selling a unit in non-warrantable buildings are either selling to a cash buyer or a buyer financing via a portfolio lender (a lender who doesn't sell to Fannie/Freddie). Washington Federal (WaFed) used to be the go to non-warrantable lender, but they exited mortgage lending in recent years. While there is a lender, somewhere, who can finance a non-warrantable condo, that stigma and limitations alone are likely to scare off a vast majority of buyers before they make it inside the unit.

Amenities: I'm not talking about a fancy gym, rooftop deck, pool, etc. I'm referring to basic amenities like in-unit washer/dryer and parking. Units not offering one, or both of these luxuries, are a much harder sell taking up more time on the market.

Given the above, I hope I've illustrated all the variables that come into focus when prepping a condo owner on the challenges they might face when preparing to list their unit for sale. The unfortunate part is that so much of this is outside the control of the homeowner. It's not as if we can just change a restrictive pet/rental policy, properly fund the associations reserve balance, or create parking where it previously never existed. Don't get me wrong, there's a buyer for any property at a certain price. The more challenges in place, the more the price needs to make up for those deficiencies.

Onto the stats: The median sale price for a Seattle condo for the month of October 2025 was $577,562. That is down .42% from last year and up MoM from $523,687. Inventory is up 12.9% YoY and the months of inventory dropped to 5.21 months from 5.45 in September. Absorption still remains at historically putrid levels though it was at the highest level since July.

Have an amazing Thanksgiving. Onward!

Danny Greco 11/20/25 Danny Greco 11/20/25

Stats, a 50 year mortgage, and layoffs. The GSHMU, November 2025

Welcome to another edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip straight to the stats, you can do so by clicking here. For more information not mentioned in the video, continue below!

In past write ups, I've referenced seasonality in regard to inventory and buyer demand, but in this edition, I want to focus on Seattle home appreciation, specifically within the first 6 months of the year. Appreciation in our market almost takes place entirely within the first 6 months of every year. January is always the bottom point for the median sales price and then values gain, quite significantly, through the second quarter. In Q3 values stall a bit, and then at the end of the year they dip only to restart their upward trend a few months later once the new year turns over. See below the starting Seattle median sale price in January, June, and the percentage increase.

Below charts the relationship in a more viewer friendly version.

What does this mean? First, I'm never one to suggest "timing the market". It's about finding the right home, however long that might take. That being said, the sooner into the new year a buyer finds a home, the less, on average, they're paying. After being provided this information, buyers sometimes conclude that it's best to buy in Q3 or Q4 once values have stagnated or possibly even declined. There's no error in that thinking, but remember this; Pricing a home involves using data of recent sales. Setting a listing price for a home set to hit the market in Q1 means using data from similar sales that took place in Q4. Values decline at the end of the year, but buyer demand often pushes prices above their list price in Q1. On the other hand, Listing a home toward the end of the year involves using data from homes that sold when values were at their peak. 6+ months of appreciation leads to higher list prices. Even though demand isn't what it was earlier in the year and buyers might have leverage to buy the house under the asking price, that final sales price can still often be higher in August than what it would be in February. So just because the market conditions are more buyer friendly, that doesn't necessarily translate into getting the house any less expensive than what was possible earlier in the year despite more competition from other buyers.

Moving on. I'm sure you've heard that President Trump has floated the idea of creating a 50 year mortgage? If not, here's one of the many articles about this. Who knows how much bite there is to this idea, but I personally think it's a terrible idea.

It's true that a longer term mortgage would improve affordability, the benefit President Trump is touting, but that monthly savings would be negligible in the big picture. Don't forget, the longer the duration of the mortgage, the higher the interest rate. On an $800,000 loan, the 50 year option saves about $541/month, which is not insignificant, however the equity build up really slows down with a 50 year term. When you're paying so much in interest those first years, you don't start paying off significant amounts of principal until much later on in the amortization schedule compared to a 30 year alternative. In fact, over the life of the loan, the borrower taking out a 50 year mortgage ends up paying roughly $900,000 MORE in interest on this $800,000 example! See below:

Metric. 30-yr 50-yr Difference

Monthly Payment $5,096 $4,555 -$541

Total Interest $1,034,584 $1,932,989 + $898,405

I'm all for affordability, but not at the expense of equity. And certainly not at these proportions.

And finally, the elephant in the room, the recent layoff situation. First of all, I want to sympathize with those who have been impacted. My purpose isn't to diminish what any layoff might mean for their personal lives and situations. Instead, I'm going to attempt to offer a headline alternative away from the doom and gloom sensationalism. The below is an excerpt I pulled from a lender contact of mine, Kyle Bergquist of Cross Country Mortgage.

"...I do want to discuss what happened (recently) in the context of its potential impact on our Puget Sound Housing Market. Here’s the thing: The health of a local job market is absolutely imperative to the health of the local real estate market. Simply put: A strong job market drives demand for housing – it attracts new residents, and good wages can help a housing market gain value. With that said, we all know the inverse is also true – A bad job market is bad for housing. And if you were just rolling with the (recent) headlines, well, you’d think Seattle’s local economy was about to become a zombie graveyard.

Here’s the thing with corporate layoff headlines: Amazon HQ1 is here in Seattle (and HQ2 in Bellevue) so we immediately think doom and gloom when we see a headline stating 30,000 corporate layoffs. But did you know that Amazon has over 350,000 corporate employees worldwide?!? Only 64,000 of those corporate employees are here in Puget Sound (50,000 in Seattle, 14,000 in Bellevue). So obviously the number isn’t going to be 30,000 HERE in Puget Sound - It’s up to 30,000 worldwide…or 14,000 worldwide?... I don’t know what the actual number is anymore, but I do know it’s only 2,303 layoffs here in Puget Sound.

Again, really terrible for all those employees – I don’t want to take that away from them; BUT if we’re looking at this purely through the lens of how this might impact our local housing market, then it’s important to know that most employees who were affected will have 90 days to look for a new role internally. During that time, Amazon recruiting teams will be prioritizing internal candidates, and according to Amazon’s job board, there are currently 11,048 open jobs posted. Why doesn’t the media talk about that more?

The headlines we don’t get are how many people were hired in any given month. We get all the bad news, with very little good news."

While definitely unfortunate, I don't believe these layoffs are the fuse that's going to set off a firework of declining home values. Anecdotally, I have buyers experiencing massive competition for certain homes in certain areas well above $1,000,000. As I've (hopefully) made clear in past reports, property type and location are returning to paramount importance when buyers are home shopping.

Onto the stats:

Seattle: In October, the median sale price for a Seattle SFR was, $1,049,999. This is the second highest median sale price of all time! This was up 8% YoY and up MoM from $975,000. Inventory was up 21% YoY while the months of inventory decreased to 2.3 months from 3.08 in October. Watch for falling months of inventory over the next few months! Also interesting is that the absorption ratio registered the LOWEST figure ever recorded in the 6+ years I've been keeping track. Low absorption yet a 2nd all-time high sale price? It seems counterintuitive.

Eastside: The median sale price was $1,550,000. That is exactly the same it was a year ago and down slightly MoM from $1,575,000. Inventory is still up significantly at 76.4% more homes on the market, but the months of inventory reduced to 2.39 months from 2.79.

King County: The median sale price was $997,000. That is up 3.9% YoY and up MoM from $957,000. Inventory is up 33.1% YoY and the months of inventory decreased to 2.29 months from 2.76 the month prior.

Have an amazing Thanksgiving! Onward!

Danny Greco 10/14/25 Danny Greco 10/14/25

Seattle Condo Market Update — September 2025

Seattle condo prices hit a 2.5-year low in October as inventory stayed elevated and days on market stretched—giving buyers leverage before holiday listings tighten.

Happy Fall!

And welcome to the latest and greatest Seattle Condo Market Update. As always, to skip straight to the stats, you can do so by clicking here. For more detailed information, continue reading below.

There was good news and bad news with September's stats for the Seattle condo market, depending on your perspective.

Ok, I'll give it a try. The good news is that, sold inventory was up 45.2% YoY. 196 units sold in September of this year vs 135 units the month before. And YoY inventory is at it's lowest mark (up 13.9%) year-to-date. In other words, inventory has been up YoY all year, it's just up at the smallest amount YTD.

However, the bad news is that the more sales resulted in lower sale prices. In fact, the median sale price for a Seattle condo in September registered the lowest amount ($523,687) since February of 2023. More sales, declining inventory, yet lower sales prices? Intuition would suggest the opposite, yet here we are. The optimist in me hopes this is the bottom and it's only up from here.

Of course, the market is not a one size fits all market. Geography plays a HUGE role in determining the expectations for sellers and I've reported A LOT on that in the past few months. For example, the months of inventory for Northwest Seattle (think Ballard, Greenwood, Green Lake, Fremont, Wallingford, etc) is 2.83 months. Contrast that to the Downtown/Belltown market of 6.71 months and you can see how important geography is. Of course, the new construction backyard DADU's that you find in North Seattle don't exist in the downtown area so that also contributes to the vast difference since those are more desirable than units in high rise downtown buildings.

Interestingly, over the last two years, and so far YTD, September has been the month of the year that's had the most inventory available. July is also well represented, too. We'll see if October can dethrone September.

Off topic, but something pretty cool that I just discovered. Our NWMLS has come out with a new tool tracking the amount of showings through the Supra keybox network. Granted, this data is across the entire NWMLS so there's no way for me to break this down into more microscopic data (county, cities, property types, ec), but it's interesting to see activity show exactly what we have been experiencing.

Despite more inventory growing during this time, showing activity decreases until after Labor Day, where it then picks up for two weeks, before declining again. But showing activity is up from last year, so that's good news (below).

Again, not really tied to anything, I just found that interesting :)

Onto the stats: The median sale price (as previously mentioned) for a Seattle condo in September 2025 was $523,687. That is down 13.6% YoY and significantly down MoM from $595,000. Inventory is up 13.9% YoY and the months of inventory rose to 5.45 months from 5.18 the month prior.

Have an amazing Halloween. Onward!

Danny Greco 10/14/25 Danny Greco 10/14/25

Seattle & Eastside Real Estate Market Update — September 2025

Seattle’s median slipped to $975K with inventory near 3 months, giving buyers more breathing room; the Eastside held around $1.58M—sellers should price and present strategically.

Welcome to October!

And welcome to the latest edition of The Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the good stuff and go straight to the stats video, you can do so by clicking here. But for deeper reporting, continue reading below.

It's election season! At least it is in Seattle, where our mayoral election is set to take place next month. Incumbent Mayor Bruce Harrell is hoping to best challenger Katie Wilson and one of, if not the hottest issue on the minds of voters, is housing.

The shortage of housing, specifically affordable housing, is not an issue unique to Seattle. It's taking place all throughout the country. While politicians can, and will forever continue to offer solutions to this problem, I'm going to give you my wildly unpopular take. Brace yourself. Here it comes: And that is, housing is simply forever destined to be expensive in our region.

Before marching at me with pitchforks and torches, hear me out: while this is my opinion, it's shaped by some of the most trusted and influential sources when it comes to our regional housing market.

While attending a recent function with some of the region's best and brightest housing economists (Matthew Gardener and Mike Appleby), the fundamental dynamics of supply and demand, land use, and shifting population demographics were on major aspects of their presentation.

In as concise a summary as possible, the Greater Seattle area has more or less been entirely built out. That means any piece of developable land has already been developed to support a house. Note, that doesn't mean we've maximized the amount of houses we can build on every lot, but in other words, every lot that can feasibly contain a housing unit, already does. That's according to the last urban growth area plan that's now roughly 30 years old and hasn't been amended since. I won't get into all of that, but simply reshaping/rezoning some of those antiquated boundaries would open up more areas for future development. Back to the problem, there's really no developable land left.

Additionally, regardless of what does or doesn't get changed in the UGA, we've got a growing problem:

Our region (King, Snohomish, and Pierce counties) are estimated to add over 1,500,000 people in the next 25 years taking the region's total population to just under 3,000,000. See below how cities within King County are forecasted to increase.

We've established there's no developable land left PLUS it's evident we need to embrace for continued population increase. Not a great combo when it comes to hoping for lower housing costs. But that's not all...

Circling back to politics; housing is (and should be) a very hot button issue when it comes to our local elections. Given the above, we know there's really nothing politicians, developers, anybody outside a divine intervention can do because we can't create more land. Being surrounded by water, forrests, hills, etc is one of the many reasons we love living where we do. But it also means we're topographically handcuffed from being able to create housing. Contrast this to areas like Texas, Las Vegas, the midwest, etc where land is so plentiful and building so easy (and far less expensive). More on that below:

Home construction/development is built upon four pillars:

1) Acquisition cost

2) Labor

3) Materials

4) Regulatory costs

We already established housing in general is expensive because of limited supply. Even those teardown homes that can be bought and replaced with multiple homes or townhomes are not cheap because the land is so valuable. Developers are paying a lot just to acquire the land, even when adding more homes than the one they're buying to tear down.

In case you've been living in a bubble over the past decade plus, just about everything costs more here compared to the rest of the country. This includes labor and materials. Our cost of living is high, therefore labor is very high. Materials aren't cheap either.

Perhaps the most forgotten variable in the cost of housing are the regulatory costs. It's estimated that roughly 25% of the total cost of home building is set aside for permitting and regulations. That's simply absurd.

If you want to look at the one area of housing a politician could actually make a realistic promise to reduce costs for the consumer, it's in the permitting process. Yet this is a huge revenue source for governments so can we really expect them to be okay with decreasing these fees? I'm not holding my breath. That being said, I will throw praise in the direction of Mayor Harrell and others who have recently recognized and made efforts to streamline the regulatory processes, and costs, that go into building ADU's, DADU's, and condominium-ized homes in Seattle.

I've been saying this for a LONG time, but in regard to housing I think the extreme NIMBY's are overly concerned at what additional housing in their communities will do to their home values, just as I believe extreme YIMBY's are far too hopeful thinking these added units will be "affordable". Housing is simply destined to forever be very expensive in our area. Don't be fooled by empty statements or promises from local politicians.

See overall affordability challenges below:

Onto the stats:

Seattle: September 2025 median sale price of $975,000. That is up 3.9% YoY, but down MoM from $1,000,000. Note, this was the first month since March that Seattle didn't notch a median sale price of $1m+. Inventory is up 12.1% YoY and the months of inventory increased to 3.08 months from 2.25, which is fairly significant.

Eastside: September 2025 median sale price of $1,575,000. That is up 3.1% YoY, and down MoM just $10,000. Inventory remains highly elevated at 60.3% more homes on the market YoY, yet the months of inventory increased only slightly to 2.79 months from 2.68 MoM.

King County: September 2025 median sale price of $957,000. That is up .7% YoY and down MoM from $990,000. Inventory is up 26.2% YoY and the months of inventory rose to 2.76 from 2.47 in August.

Have an amazing October! Onward!

Danny Greco 9/18/25 Danny Greco 9/18/25

Greater Seattle Housing Market Update — August 2025

Buyer activity hit multi-year lows, yet Seattle stayed a million-dollar city; the Eastside softened slightly and inventory is poised to tighten as we head into fall.

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the good stuff and go right to the latest figures for August, you can do so by clicking here. For more analysis, continue below!

This Seattle Times article was published on September 5th and it breaks down, very simplistically, the diverse real estate market that we're experiencing (bonus points if you noticed I'm quoted in this article). Perhaps more than ever since I've been a realtor, factors like location and property type are increasingly influential when factoring in time on market, and thus seller expectations. I've discussed this before in past market updates, but can't stress enough how important it is to paint finely as opposed to broadly when breaking down the local housing market.

I know the above isn't the prettiest, but bare with me. I want to include the connection between three variables: the median sale price, months of inventory, and median days to sell over the past 6+ years. What we see is a little different from what I would have expected.

Thinking back to our ECON 101 classes, we're reminded of the fundamental dynamics of supply and demand and I know nobody reading this is a stranger to the supply/demand relationship within housing. Especially over the last few years. But is the market cooling, or is it gaining strength? There are plenty of articles saying one thing or the other. So which is it?

In a vacuum, the higher the months of inventory goes, the more prices should remain neutral, or even drop. Instead, they're hovering around all-time highs. In fact, the city of Seattle has posted a $1,000,000 or higher median sale price for 6 consecutive months! There are only 3 months where Seattle has hit $1,000,000 or higher (ever!) and those months happened between April and June of 2022, which was the absolute peak of the market when buyers knew interest rates were on the rise and competition was fierce before rates got to a point that leveled demand. Given the financial hurdles over the past 3 years, I find Seattle's surge in the median sale price to be simply fascinating.

In past reports, I've proven that we have to dig a little deeper to find the truth with what's happening and showed that much of the increased inventory are townhomes. Land is king and homes that don't share walls and sit on lots big enough for yards, parking, etc, it's those homes that are becoming increasingly scarce, and thus disproportionately valuable relative to townhomes. To take it a step further, I wanted to also highlight a metric we haven't yet talked about. The homes that AREN'T selling.

Imagine that! Homes that actually don't sell during their time on the market. Believe it or not, this happens. My question; is this happening in greater numbers compared to previous years?

For context, I was only able to search listings that were canceled or expired within Seattle. There were too many results for King County and the NWMLS limits me whenever the data returns 5,000+ results.

Obviously we don't know just how 2025 will end up, but I'm a little surprised to see that there aren't more home listings being cancelled or expired in recent years compared to pre-pandemic years. So far, my theory that more homes were being listed and NOT selling, doesn't seem to be true. Darnit. Perhaps it's just they're taking longer to sell? That's a topic for another month.

One variable that could be a HUGE push for buyers is interest rates. At the time I'm creating this, mortgage interest rates are at their lowest levels in almost a year. The labor market is finally showing the cracks so many had expected were there and that's driving investors to the bond market, pushing mortgage rates lower. TLDR: economic turmoil, including poor job/labor figures, are generally positive for lower mortgage rates.

See the downward trend in the 30 year fixed above. Not satisfied? Still waiting for rates to drop below 6% before making a move? Well, we're already there...in a way. See below

Remember ARM loans? ARM = Adjustable Rate Mortgage. These are mortgages that are fixed for a certain period of time (7 years in this example) and then adjust every year after that. For years, ARM's have been completely irrelevant. Not just during the time the 30 year fixed rate was under 4%, but even more recently when there wasn't much difference between a 30 year rate and an ARM. However, that's recently started to change.

ARM rates are now below 6% and the spread between the rate on a 30 year vs an ARM is increasing making ARM's more attractive than they've been in years. If you're a buyer who's been on the fence waiting for rates to drop, you might want to talk with a mortgage lender on what ARM rates look like and how you might be able to accelerate that home purchase. And for those of you worried that the ARM loans today are the same risky mortgages that induced the Great Financial Crisis of 2007-8, don't be. The qualification requirements to be approved for ARM loans today is a complete 180 degree difference compared to the loans that sank the global economy. In fact, it's harder to qualify for an ARM mortgage than a 30 year mortgage!

Nevertheless, a .5%-.75% difference on a mortgage of $800,000 can be significant. A $260/month savings at a 6% rate compared to 6.5%. Additionally, $128/month difference in 5.75% vs 6%. Roughly a potential $375/month difference in 7/1 ARM interest rates vs 30 year fixed rates. I would definitely recommend looking at ARM's to buyers who KNOW they're not going to own the home for the entire fixed rate period, or if they plan on paying off that mortgage before the loan adjusts. Something to think about.

Onto the stats!

Seattle - The median sale price for a SFR in August 2025 was $1,000,000. That is up 7.5% YoY, and down just $10,000 MoM. Inventory is up 17.4% YoY and the months of inventory stat was flat MoM currently sitting at 2.25 months. Worth noting, the absorption rate was the LOWEST I have seen in my 6+ years measuring these stats.

Eastside - The median sale price in August was $1,537,500 (the lowest since November). That is down .8% YoY and down MoM from $1,580,000. Inventory is up 68.8% YoY and the months of inventory increased MoM to 2.68 months from 2.54.

King County - The median sale price in August was $990,000. That is up 3.67% YoY and down just $10,000 MoM. Inventory is still up 32.4% YoY and the months of inventory was stagnant MoM, currently sitting at 2.47 months.

Enjoy our last month of summer. Fall is upon us! Onward!

Danny Greco 9/18/25 Danny Greco 9/18/25

Seattle Condo Market Update– August 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Seattle condo market update. As always, you can skip the good stuff and go right to the stats by clicking here. For more detailed, and hopefully entertaining info, continue reading below!

I've got to admit, each month I struggle trying to find new material for this writeup. The Seattle condo market has been stuck in the mud for so long that I feel like Bill Murray from Groundhog's Day where each month I see the same data and forcibly try to create new stories out of nothing. For those of you who have soldiered on reading these, I genuinely appreciate you and hopefully one day these reports will kick it up a few notches from an entertainment and value perspective.

(This is me assessing the health of the condo market month after month)

If you have access to the Seattle Times, you can read an article I contributed to here discussing one of the problems with the current market. The problem I refer to in the article is that the monthly cost of a mortgage compared to renting a similar property has really widened.

For example, look at this Belltown condo that's currently for sale. If a buyer were to purchase this home by putting 20% down, their total mortgage payment (at 6.25%) would be $2,900. Yet a similar 1 bedroom unit in this building just rented in early August for $2,225/month. That's a $675/month difference in monthly payment! Furthermore, this condo currently for sale was purchased back in 2019 for $433,000 (currently listed for $389k). Tell me what is attractive to consumers looking at paying a 30% monthly premium for an asset that's been, let's face it, borderline toxic over the past 7-8 years.

Owning has almost always been more expensive on a monthly housing payment comparison, but the long term benefit homeowners could safely bet on was appreciation. Yet appreciation, for a number of years, has not been the consistent savior it's historically been. To be fair, there are still tax and other advantages that help highlight the pros of homeownership, but they often don't outweigh the superficial savings consumers see when there's a staggering distance in monthly living costs like we're currently seeing between a mortgage and rent.

However, that margin between the cost of renting vs buying might be changing, and might not favor renters as much as it currently does. See this Seattle Times article highlighting the lack of apartment construction and some of the more powerful highlights below:

"Across King County, local governments permitted fewer multifamily units in 2024 than they did in any year of the prior decade. The slowdown appears to be here to stay for now. In Seattle, apartment permitting was down 66% in the first six months of this year, compared with the same period a year ago."

"For renters, this decline means they will likely find fewer available apartments and higher rent increases in the years to come, as the market absorbs a glut of apartments permitted during ultralow interest rate pandemic years."

"This year, Seattle is now on track to experience one of its slowest years for apartment permitting since at least 2018."

There's no saying that the dynamics will make a 180 degree turn around and revert to what we became accustomed to during the 2010's, but it does appear that we might be starting to exit the most renter friendly period we've seen in a very long time. I know in past reports I've identified variables that could provide relief to the Seattle condo market (RTO mandates, FHA/VA condo approvals, and now a slowdown in apartment building), but nothing has single handedly, or collectively, made any dent in the hemorrhaging condo market. In fact, the absorption rate this month was the lowest since September of last year, which was an all-time low in the time I've been measuring it.

Onto the stats!

The median sale price for a Seattle condo in August 2025 was $595,000. That is up 7.2% YoY and up from $550,000 MoM. Inventory remains elevated at 23.6% more homes on the market than the same month last year. The months of inventory statistic didn't change MoM as there's still 5.1 months of inventory.

Enjoy the last week of summer. Bring on fall! Onward!

Danny Greco 8/26/25 Danny Greco 8/26/25

Who can save the condo market? The Seattle Condo Market Update, August 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the fun stuff and go right to the latest monthly stats, click here. To learn more about what's going on in our local condo market, continue below!

As the title suggests, everybody in the real estate industry from local realtors to head economists at Fortune 500 companies are asking the same question: Where are the buyers? This Seattle Times article breaks down the declining percentage of married homeowners between the ages of 25-34 since the 1960's. To be fair, there are many variables that have contributed to declining levels in both homeownership and marriage between this age group. Still, for home sellers, particularly homeowners of riskier assets like condos, a buyer population delaying home purchasing is not the most encouraging news.

Going a step further, I'm curious if there's a potential demographic of buyers who might be able to save the condo market?

So who could potentially represent the savior(s) for the condo market? My theory; perhaps it's time condo associations start appealing to buyers seeking government financing, specifically VA and FHA mortgages.

Let's take a step back. There are primarily 3 types of mortgages buyers can obtain (4 if counting jumbo loans, but we'll exclude them for the purposes of this email). By far, the most popular is the standard conventional mortgage. These are the loans that are underwritten and guaranteed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

FHA financing is a government sponsored loan that often gets the moniker of being a first time home buyer loan. These loans don't only apply to first time home buyers, however the looser restrictions around down payment (3.5% minimum), credit score, and debt-to-income ratios (allowing over 50%) often make it more ideal for some first time buyers.

VA (Veterans Affairs) financing is a very special lending option open to active and past servicemen and women. This is also government sponsored and does not require any down payment in addition to requiring the seller to pay for certain fees normally absorbed by the buyer/vet.

Back to my point...

Year to date, I've had a few challenging condo listings that were ultimately saved by buyers seeking VA or FHA financing. One instance was a condo in Belltown that was on the market over 400 days. We actually sold the unit twice, both times to a VA buyer, but the first buyer backed out 10 days before closing and lost their earnest money. I maintain that the only reason we sold this condo was because we were the only condo project in Belltown that was VA approved. We needed a miracle and that prayer was answered thanks to a VA buyer.

In another listing, this particular building was not FHA or VA approved, however after almost 2 months on the market we received an offer from a buyer seeking FHA financing. Note, just because the building is not FHA approved doesn't necessarily mean that a buyer can't purchase a unit securing FHA financing. This is called a spot approval. Long story short, but after the first lender failed to secure the approval in the 11th hour, another lender jumped in and saved the day. Because this buyer could only be approved for FHA financing, and due to no other condos in this area (Ballard) being approved for FHA financing, we really had no competition for our buyer.

I know this is all anecdotal, but maybe my experiences might be a microcosm for the greater condo market?

I created the graph above charting the number of condos bought/sold in Seattle dating back to 2010 and the total number of FHA and VA buyers. Note the massive drop off after 2010 and ask yourself, why were buyers for Seattle condos seeking government loans in such great numbers 10+ years ago?

The answer is simple. The housing market was still bottoming out from the Great Financial Crisis and condo associations knew that in order to maximize their chances of selling units most quickly and for as high a sale price as possible, they needed to appeal to every buyer possible. That included jumping through every administrative and financial hoop necessary to become FHA and VA approved. However, as the years went on, and the market rebounded and strengthened into the behemoth we know it to be now, associations became a little...lazy? Picky? Elitist? Probably a little of each.

To be fair, the percentage of buyers seeking FHA or VA financing is pretty slim these days.

Loan Type 2019 2023 2024

Conventional 89.7% 90.7% 90.6%

FHA 5.5% 5.9% 5.5%

VA 4.8% 3.4% 3.9%

We can see that last year, within King County, less than 10% of home buyers utilized FHA or VA financing. If there were a way to break this down into condos, I'm sure the percentage would be even smaller.

If I were a condo owner, regardless if I had any intention of selling anytime soon, I'd strongly encourage the governing body of the association to look into becoming FHA and/or VA approved. Not only does it allow your realtor the ability to market the unit to a wider range of buyers, but meeting FHA and VA approval standards ensures the financial strength of the association will not be an issue for any financing type, whether that be conventional, or either of these government backed programs.

Onto the stats: In July of 2025, the median sale price of a Seattle condo was $550,000. That is down 1.6% YoY and down from $589,000 MoM. Inventory is up 29.3% YoY and the months of inventory statistic jumped to 5.10 months from 4.63 the month prior. Note, the downtown and Belltown areas are currently experiencing 10.3 months of inventory!

Enjoy the final stretch of summer! Onward!

Danny Greco 8/26/25 Danny Greco 8/26/25

A shrinking window of opportunity. The Greater Seattle Housing Market Update, August 2025

And welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skp the good stuff and go right to the stats, you can watch a video by clicking here. For the rest of you, continue below!

We're smack dab in the middle of what I call the "opportunity season" for buyers. What I mean by that is this; we're no longer in the scarcely listed months of the year (Q1 and early Q2) that are historically a seller's best friend where they capitalize on strong buyer demand and minimal competition from other competing homes for sale. Inventory levels are increasing month by month (and will likely continue to do so for another month or two), but we might be beginning to see this window of opportunity starting to close on buyer's.

Happy to, Seth! See below!

I apologize, the chart above is a little messy, but the point I want to convey is this; while overall inventory for SFR homes in King County are at their HIGHEST levels since June of 2019, new listings have now declined month over month for the third straight month. The new listing data is a leading indicator to overall inventory so what I expect to see over the next 1-2 months is overall inventory increasing before we see significant drops in Q4 (November, specifically).

Buyer's if there is a window of time where you can maximize your chances to get into a home 1) without competing against other buyers, 2) without waiving contingencies, and/or 3) negotiating the home at or under the asking price, the data suggests THAT TIME IS NOW! Note, this is not me encouraging you in attempting to time the market. If we've talked before then you know I never preach timing the market. Buy when the time is right for you and your lifestyle. Still, the data is hard to ignore the opportunity it presents every year at this time.

Furthermore, and just for fun, I'll assume the role of playing devil's advocate as to why this window of opportunity might be closing quicker than we would expect.

See the graph (blue line) above charting the 30 year mortgage rate YTD. At the time I'm creating this article, interest rates are not only at their lowest level of the year, but at their lowest levels since October of last year. This has primarily been driven by favorable news on the tariff front as those have become more settled, and so far, haven't created the long term turbulence many had feared. Again, we're not 100% in the clear here, but so far the markets are pretty comfortable with the outlook on how these will continue to settle. Remember, markets LOVE stability.

I see your interest rates and raise you the general YTD stock performances in both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq, as well as some of our region's biggest employers. Starting with the below S&P 500 and Nasdaq.

The stock market has been on a tear this year. After the crash induced Liberation Day announcements, the overall market has 100% rebounded and continued to push all time highs (at the time of this typing). We're seeing this first hand with some of our regional behemoths (below).

With many homebuyers working for these local economic powerhouses, especially those in the tech fields, it's not uncommon to see down payment sizes tied to the stock price of their respective companies. A stronger performing stock, the more a buyer can draw from that and use toward a down payment, thus increasing their buying power.

Don't get me wrong, layoffs have been taking place left and right YTD (especially in tech), so while the stock portfolios of those still employed continue to bloom, the overall uneasiness may keep those potential buyers on the sidelines until they feel greater stability in their professional future.

Bottom line; 60-90 days from now we can expect to see significant drops in available homes for sale. If mortgage rates continue to stabilize, or even decline while the stock market continues to chart new highs, we could be primed for a very seller friendly and competitive Q1/2 of 2026. This can result in bidding wars, escalated sale prices, waiving of contingencies, etc. Not anything we don't already see most Q1/2 of every year, but perhaps it can be argued we could be on the path of things being more escalated than they have in recent years. Again, just playing devil's advocate here, but it's not the craziest outcome to consider.

Onto the stats:

Seattle: July 2025's median SFR sale price was $1,010,000. That is up 3.9% YoY and down MoM from $1,080,000. Note, this is the 5th straight month Seattle has registered a median sale price of at least $1,000,000. Never before has this been accomplished. Inventory is up 19% YoY and the months of inventory was flat MoM.

Eastside: July 2025 median SFR sale price of $1,580,000. That is down 2.5% YoY and down MoM from $1,610,000. This is the first time all year the median sale price has dipped below $1.6m. Inventory is still up big at 90% more homes on the market YoY, however the months of inventory decreased MoM from 2.64 to 2.54.

King County: July 2025 median SFR sale price of $1,000,000. That is flat YoY, but down MoM from $1,039,000. Inventory is up 43.3% YoY and the months of inventory was flat MoM and remains at 2.4 months.

Enjoy and onward!

Danny Greco 7/22/25 Danny Greco 7/22/25

Who's really the boogeyman? The Greater Seattle Housing Market Update, July 2025

Welcome to the latest and greatest Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. I hope your summer is going well and you're getting plenty of vitamin D. As always, to jump right into the stats you can do so by clicking here. For more/better information (and hopefully some entertainment), keep reading below!

Given the subject of this article, I understand this would have been more appropriate to post in October, but I want to talk about something that's been grinding my gears for years. Or maybe I'm just experiencing writer's block? Either way, over the years I've consistently heard a lot of misinformation when it comes to our local housing market, but probably the most misunderstood belief I see, hear, and read all over the place is that investors are to blame for inflationary costs of real estate.

"If it weren't for investors gobbling up houses, first time home buyers would be able to buy." Or "we need to tax all the homes just sitting vacant or not allow homes to be used for investments". Or "investors are pricing out first time homebuyers." And dozens of different versions of these arguments.

I'll preface my response that, like everything, the validity of this belief/argument depends on one's location. I 100% believe that in some areas of the country this problem can be very real. However, as the data will show, there isn't any merit for this argument in the Greater Seattle area, let alone in Washington State.

Institutional investors are defined as investors who purchase 10+ homes within a calendar year. This includes companies like Black Rock, probably the most infamous real estate investment brand when it comes to purchasing rental properties, and could also include very active flipping companies that operate within their own backyard. The graph above charts the purchase activity of institutional investors through the first quarter of 2025.

Above is for all of 2024.

And the above shows the comparison going back to 2020.

What is glaringly obvious is that institutional investors in the Greater Seattle area and Washington state are buying real estate at a fraction of the level compared to the national average. In fact, the median percentage of homes bought by institutional investors at this time was only 5.35% and 5.5% in Washington State and Seattle, respectively. Nationally, that median figure was 13.85%.

According to this article from the University of Washington, they estimate ~78,000 homes sold across Washington state in 2024. If we take the average rate of consumption by institutional investors for 2024 (5.4%), that's 4,200+ homes sold, which isn't totally insignificant, but it's hardly enough to single handedly point the blame at one demographic of the home buying population.

You want the dirty truth? Can you handle it?

The reality is that, if you're looking for a demographic of who to blame for rising housing prices...look in the mirror.

The truth can hurt, but it can also be revelatory. The buyer's in the Greater Seattle area you're competing against are likely to be very similar to you. They're not faceless investors competing to buy your home to simply add to their massive rental portfolio. Especially with the increase of mortgage rates over the past 3 years, it's even less likely they're investors at all whether that be institutional or mom and pop investors. Instead, they're just like you. A FTHB looking to get their foot into the door of homeownership. They're move-up buyers looking to expand their housing footprint to satisfy their expanding lifestyle. They're relocating into the city to be closer to work, they're moving to the suburbs for more space, they're relocating to another state to be closer to family, etc. You are the competition!

The data shows us that, rather than a single boogeyman existing, the market is made up of tens of thousands of different boogeymen and women, in more or less the same mold of each other. Don't get me wrong, investors contribute to inflated home prices, but not by any significant margin. It's our peers who are driving up the cost of homes, which of course has been exacerbated by the shortage of homes over the past 10+ years.

On that note...did you know that last month recorded the highest level of inventory in King and Snohomish counties (combined) since June 2019? And the months of inventory was the highest since January of 2019.

Yet, despite that, we set all time records for the median sale price in Seattle and King County.

I know. It defies intuition. See the stats below:

Seattle: June 2025 median sale price of $1,079,950. That is up 12.9% YoY and up MoM from $1,010,650. Inventory is up 35% YoY and the months of inventory dropped to 2.2 months from 2.5 months in May.

Eastside: June 2025 median sale price of $1,610,000. That is down 1.5% YoY and down from $1,633,500 MoM. Inventory is up 91.7% YoY and the months of inventory dropped slightly to 2.6 months from 2.7 months in May.

King County: June 2025 median sale price of $1,033,950. That is up 7.2% YoY and up MoM from $989,000. Inventory is up 49.7% YoY and the months of inventory dropped to 2.37 months from 2.45 months in May.

Have an amazing July! Onward!

Danny Greco 7/22/25 Danny Greco 7/22/25

Buyer's to the rescue? The Seattle Condo Market Update, July 2025

Welcome to the latest and greatest edition of the Seattle condo market update. As always, to skip right to the data, you can do so by clicking here. For more education, and maybe some entertainment, continue below!

Well, let's start with the bad news.

June of 2025 was not a great month for Seattle condo sales. In fact, the absorption rate registered the lowest level since September of last year and one of the lowest levels of all time. Remember, the absorption rate is essentially the rate at which buyers are absorbing the available inventory.

To be fair, Q3 is the time of year when absorption historically tanks (yes, I know June is still Q2) so to see poor levels this early isn't a great leading indicator for what the next few months might look like. That being said, there could be a savior for the market lurking in the shadows.

Above is the graph charting mortgage purchase applications since the beginning of last year. For a number of consecutive weeks/months, the growth in mortgage purchase applications has reflected YoY double digit growth. And earlier this month topped the highest week for activity since late January 2024. To be fair, 2024 was putrid for purchase applications so while the gains are significant, comparing today's numbers to one of the most dormant times in history isn't exactly something worthy of a parade. Still, it's hope! Imagine what this would look like once rates start consistently trending downward (though it's been 3 years since our industry has been saying that).

Of course, as I've made painfully clear in numerous past reports, location, the number of bedrooms, and the type of condo make huge differences in seeing what's being absorbed by buyers. Avoiding the news headlines and diving deeper into the sub-markets will help expose the real stories with what's going on in our local market.

Onto the stats:

In June 2025 the median sale price for a Seattle condo was $589,000. That is up 7.1% YoY and up from $573,250 the month before. Inventory is up 25.6% YoY, but the months of inventory dropped to 4.6 months from 5 months in June.

Enjoy your summer! Onward

Danny Greco 4/17/25 Danny Greco 4/17/25

Can we exit this ride? The Seattle condo market update, April 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the good stuff and go straight to me sputtering out the facts, you can watch by clicking here.

What a time to be alive! Holy cow, unless you've been living in a cave year to date (in which case, I'm jealous), you've been relentlessly distracted with all that's going on in the finance world. Tariffs, interest rates, crashing/surging stock markets, etc. Every day seems to be more volatile than the last, making this the most turbulent financial roller coaster I can remember.

(BTW, I hate roller coasters. Unforutunately, I have zero tolerance for motion sickness stuff so these are torture for me). Perhaps equally as nauseating as a real roller coaster has been the economic roller coaster we've experienced since Trump (re)entered office. Take a look at some of the charts below.

The S&P is down over 7% YTD. Not alarming had this decline been gradual, but just look at the volatility over the past few weeks!

The same goes for the tech heavy Nassaq. I pay particular attention to the Nasdaq because many of our tech employees source the funds for their down payment through their vested stock. Thus, the more that stock dwindles away, the less down payment they have for a potential purchase.

One historical silver lining in stock market volatility is that it induces traders into shifting portfolios into bonds, thus applying downward pressure on mortgage rates. The above is the 10 year bond, which most closely parallels the 30 year mortgage.

That being said, mortgage rates haven't dropped that much in relation to how much the stock markets have imploded. In fact, during the week of April 7th, when equity markets were getting absolutely hammered, rates increased! There was a brief moment where rates were in the mid 6's before the coil sprung back and returned to the high 6's during the middle of the tariff exchanges.

How this impacts the local real estate market remains to be seen. Anecdotally, it feels just like every other spring selling season, which is extremely competitive for buyers. So far, I don't see much pullback from buyers.

Onto the stats:

The median sale price for a Seattle condo in March 2025 was $627,650. That is up YoY 6.8% and up MoM from $625,000. Inventory remains high at up 54.7% YoY and the months of inventory statistic came in at 3.22 months, a bit lower than 3.51 last month.

Bottom line, this isn't the first time we've experienced turbulent economic times. The above chart was put together by a lending partner of mine, Kyle Bergquist of Cross Country Mortgage, that timestamps all the wild economic events over the past few decades and how Puget Sound home values have responded. Remember, it's not about timing the market, it's about time in the market. We simply lack the supply to meet the demand and I don't see that changing pending monumental shifts in the regional economy.

Danny Greco 4/15/25 Danny Greco 4/15/25

Can we exit this ride? The Greater Seattle Housing Market Update, April 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the good stuff and go straight to me sputtering out the facts, you can watch by clicking here.

The S&P is down over 7% YTD. Not alarming had this decline been gradual, but just look at the volatility over the past few weeks!

Onto the stats:

Seattle: March 2025 median SFR sale price of $1,000,000. That is up 8.1% YoY. and up MoM from $965,000. Inventory is up 31.4% YoY and the months of inventory dropped to 1.65 months from 1.8 the month before.

Eastside: March 2025 median SFR sale price of $1,710,000. That is up 1.6% YoY and up slightly MoM from $1,685,000. Inventory is up a whopping 86.4% YoY while the months of inventory dropped to 1.73 months from 2.13 the month prior.

King County: March 2025 median SFR sale price of $977,500. That is up 3.4% YoY and up from $915,000 MoM. Inventory is up 49.8% YoY while the months of inventory dropped to 1.52 months from 1.82.

Onward!

Danny Greco 3/13/25 Danny Greco 3/13/25

The Greater Seattle Condo Market Update March 2025

And welcome to the latest edition of the Seattle Condo Market Update. As always, to skip the analysis and go right to the stats, click here. For a more detailed look at everything going on in our crazy world, continue below!

Tariffs, interest rates, job losses, recession talk, etc. 2025 is sure coming in hot with lots of market moving news! It's been challenging trying to keep track of it all.

Tariffs - Simply put, tariffs are a tax imposed on foreign imports. The Trump administration states that the US has been "ripped off" with unfair trade imbalances and these tariffs, most notably those applied to Mexico, Canada, and China, are designed to even out the playing field, ultimately (hopefully in their eyes) bringing more jobs back to the states. Of course, these countries retaliate with tariffs of their own on US imports so we'll see what, if any, impact this barrage of tariffs will have.

The tariff on Canadian lumber looks to have the largest potential impact on real estate. Obviously, lumber is crucial to the construction of homes so if the price of that goes up, it ultimately gets passed onto the buyer. Remember during the pandemic when supply chains were constrained and the price of lumber skyrocketed? It was more than double the cost of what it is now. In the Seattle area, we are not a big new construction market so I don't see the potential impact of the lumber really doing anything to impact our prices locally.

Layoffs - Perhaps the policies creating the biggest waves of the new (but old?) administration is the layoffs and its impact on employment. Of course these are most specifically tied to federal agencies, but we've seen more layoffs in the private sector too. Locally, Redfin, Microsoft, Starbucks, and Blue Origin have all announced layoffs this year. I'm sure there have been many others, but these have been the most publicized.

For anybody worried about layoffs at the FHA level, and how that may impact your ability to buy a home (if pursuing FHA financing), see my comments in the Seattle Times article here.

Recession - The "R" word, as I call it. This is one of those words that really brings with it a more negative connotation than what I think it deserves. Plainly put, economic recessions are normal. They're part of the financial circle of life. The severity of each recession can vary, but in general, they don't last too long, and with the exception of the Great Financial Crisis of 2007-8, are pretty positive for the real estate market.

We know the FED has been using every ounce of strength possible to keep inflation low, hoping to reach a 2% target. While they haven't hit their target, they've succeeded in preventing inflation from ramping up again, which would trigger additional rate increases. However, for anybody who follows Housing Wire's lead analyst Logan Mothashami (total rock star of a housing analysis, BTW), you'll know that he's identified the FED's playbook, which is to favor labor readings over inflation readings. In other words, he understands that, at this point, the FED is paying more attention to the labor market and justifying their monetary policy there more than inflation readings. This is important because if the unemployment number starts to tick up, the FED will be pressured to lower rates. Will the layoffs at the federal level be the match that starts this wild fire?

If we're thrust into a recession because of job losses, this is where real estate can really take off.

Interest rates - At times of economic contraction, FED policies attempt to encourage lending by lowering their FED funds rate. We know their rate isn't directly tied to mortgage rates, but if investors (specifically bond traders) get increasingly concerned with the outlook on the US economy, that will trigger investments away from stocks and into bonds. Those of us with a 401k, or anybody who invests in the stock market, can attribute to how terrible their portfolio has performed YTD. Yet what's bad for the stock market can often be good for mortgage rates. That's the inverse relationship to watch out for. Special hint, track the 10-year treasury bond if you want to track the instrument most closely tied to the 30 year mortgage.

The chart above highlights the relationship between US home values during recessions. Notice that the only time values really declined in a recession was during the GFC. A recession that was entirely created by the housing market so it made sense that values would tumble! We'd have to go back to the Great Depression to see the last time housing values tanked so badly. Both of those events were once in a generation type of nuclear financial disasters so the best thing any of us can do is to disassociate the word "recession" with any thoughts, feelings, or anything we remember at all about the GFC. Again, recessions are normal in a financial life cycle. And in regard to housing, historically pretty positive for home values.

What to watch out for - I suspect things will continue to be very volatile as the Trump administration works to secure their footing in regard to their campaign promises. Financial markets do not like unpredictability so watching how each of these variables affect one another, plus the influence they have over the stock market, bond market, housing market, etc will keep us all on our toes.

Bottom line, don't let any of this distract you. Home buying and selling is all about time "in" the market, not "timing" the market. People overwhelmingly buy and sell real estate to support changes in lifestyles, regardless of what's happening economically. Oddly, whatever event(s) bring about declining mortgage rates could be the kick in the pants the housing market has been lacking. Most people don't realize this, but the housing industry has been in a recession of it's own for almost 3 years now (not that I'm complaining). In fact, it's been the worst housing recession in 30 years, from a sales number standpoint! Lower rates could jumpstart the market in spite of the larger economy turning negative.

Onto the stats:

The median sale price for a Seattle condo in February 2025 was $625,000. That is up 12% YoY, but down MoM from the all time high of $689,975. Inventory is still up 55% YoY, but the months of inventory statistic fell to 3.51 months from 4.37 in January.

Enjoy March Madness, the blooming cherry blossoms, St. Patty's Day, daylight savings time, etc!

Onward!

Danny Greco 3/13/25 Danny Greco 3/13/25

The "R" word and housing ; The Greater Seattle Housing Market Update, March 2025

And welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip the analysis and go right to the stats, click here. For a more detailed look at everything going on in our crazy world, continue below!

Tariffs, interest rates, job losses, recession talk, etc. 2025 is sure coming in hot with lots of market moving news! It's been challenging trying to keep track of it all.

For anybody worried about layoffs at the FHA level, and how that may impact your ability to buy a home (if pursuing FHA financing), see my comments in the Seattle Times article here.

If we're thrust into a recession because of job losses, this is where real estate can really take off.

Onto the stats:

Seattle - The median sale price for a Seattle single family home in February 2025 was $965,000. That is up 4% YoY and up massively MoM from $857,000. Inventory is still up 27.8% YoY, but the months of inventory statistic has decreased MoM to 1.82 months from 2.6 in January.

Eastside - The median sale price for a single family home on the eastside in February 2025 was $1,685,000. That is up 14.6% YoY, but down MoM from $1,709,000. Inventory is up a whopping 61.9% YoY and the months of inventory slightly declined to 2.13 months from 2.22.

King County - The median sale price for a single family home in King County in February 2025 was $915,000. That is flat YoY (up by just $500) and up massively MoM from $855,000. Inventory is still up YoY by 37.2%, but the months of inventory dropped to 1.82 months from 2.14 in January.

Enjoy March Madness, the blooming cherry blossoms, St. Patty's Day, daylight savings time, etc!

Onward!

Danny Greco 2/18/25 Danny Greco 2/18/25

A buyer's delight? The Greater Seattle housing market update, February 2025

Welcome to the latest and greatest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. The first edition of 2025 to contain data from 2025! Hooray! As always, to skip right to the stats, you can do so by clicking here. For more context on everything taking place in our wild local market, continue reading below.

I'll admit, when I first saw the January 2025 stats, I had to take a closer look because I was very surprised at what I saw.

Historically, every year January is the month where we see the lowest levels of inventory. Very, very few homes hit the market after Halloween, so what is on the market during those months are often properties listed in August, September, October, etc that linger before selling, if they sell at all. Therefore, when the new year turns over, we find ourselves at rock bottom for available homes. This is also exactly the time buyers start their search. This is what leads to very friendly seller conditions that persist through April or May, depending on the year.

So you can imagine my surprise when I saw January 2025 had the most homes for sale of any January going back to 2019. In fact, there were 50% more homes on the market compared to January of one year ago!

But something wasn't right. Despite what the data showed, January felt very different for me and my clients. My listings, including ones that had already been on the market for months, were getting more showings than they had been months prior. My buyers were facing intense multiple offer situations every week. So why does the data suggest a more buyer friendly market? This got me thinking that perhaps the answer lies within the superficial data. What I hypothesized turned out to be exactly what I found.

See the graph above. It charts the total number of active townhomes and non-townhomes for sale in the month of January going back to 2019. Looking at the far right column, it's evident to see that, just about every year, we see townhomes taking up a larger share of total available inventory.

To be fair, this isn't unlocking any groundbreaking discovery. In an effort to create more units, townhomes must be constructed at the expense of single family homes on big enough lots, and we've been seeing this play out for decades. Nevertheless, it's very interesting to me to show that, despite there being 2772 homes available in January 2019 vs 1820 in January 2025, the share of active townhomes relative to total active homes for sale almost tripled from 8.8% to 22%.

It means that as more and more townhomes are constructed, buyer's are less and less excited about buying them. This isn't to imply that buyer's shouldn't be excited about buying a townhome. After all, I still own my townhome that was my very first home. However, as unattached single family homes become more and more scarce, the demand for that asset increases, and with that, the price.

This would be the reason my experiences in 2025 so far don't match what the data reflects. My buyers who have been pursuing unattached single family homes have been experiencing fierce competition. Buyers pursuing townhomes and condos, that's a very different story.

Onto the stats:

Seattle: January 2025 median sale price of $857,500. That is a 1.3% decrease YoY and down MoM from $899,000. Inventory is up 36.4% YoY and the months of inventory statistic increased to 2.6 months from 1.42.

Eastside: January 2025 median sale price of $1,709,000. That is a 16.7% increase YoY and up MoM from $1,545,000. Inventory is up 60.9% YoY and the months of inventory statistic increased to 2.22 from 1.24 months.

King County: January 2025 median sale price of $855,000. That is up .6% YoY and down MoM from $875,000. Inventory is up 49.9% YoY and the months of inventory statistic increased to 2.14 months from 1.28.

The absorption metric hit it's highest reading since April of last year, but was still about 20% lower than January of last year.

Onward!

Danny Greco 2/18/25 Danny Greco 2/18/25

Shattering the record books. The Seattle condo market update, February 2025

Welcome to the latest and greatest edition of the February 2025 Seattle condo market. Our first report of 2025 that contains 2025 data! As always, to skip right to the stats you can do so by clicking here though I'd strongly encourage reading on. Let's go!

As the subject indicates, January 2025 set a new record for the median sale price of a Seattle condo. Let's be frank, it blew any previous record out of the water. The median sale price of a Seattle condo registered $689,975 last month, besting a previous record of $606,000 in September of 2024. In fact, there have only been 3 months where the median price has EVER eclipsed $600,000 or more. For a new record to best its previous by almost 14% was definitely unexpected.

Now, to be fair, those of you who have been following my reports know that these stats are not a true representative of the condo market because they include the new-ish condo-ized units that function more like townhomes or single family homes. For a more consistent look, see the chart below.

What I've done to create the graph above is to isolate condos to only the 1 story variety. This removes the condo-ized units from our equation. To be fair, there are traditional condos that have more than 1 story (townhome style condos), but they're pretty rare. This graph is a more pure look at the condo market, IMO.

As expected, the median sale price really hasn't fluctuated too much over the last 5 years. Isolating only the month of January, 2025 was the second highest level we've seen over the past 5 years, only second to 2024.

Despite the sensational headline surrounding the median sales price, it was the inventory statistic that really surprised me.

Historically, January is the low point for inventory. Same goes for the SFR market. The market is pretty depressed after Halloween. Not only is there a lack of any new inventory coming to market, but buyers are also disengaged. The weather also doesn't help making it pretty unconducive to tour properties when it's dark by 4pm, cold, and there are lots of vacations planned given the time of year. Because of that, it makes sense that we enter January at ground zero as far as available inventory goes.

Yet January 2025 saw WAY more active listings than any other January going back to 2019. However, when I extract the condo-ized units and only leave room for the traditional 1-story condo, the stats are mostly the same, but not as dramatic.

In my report on the single family market, I focused on the percentage of townhomes that are representing a larger and larger share of the total single family market active inventory. Are we possibly seeing the same thing in the condo market? See below:

Visible in the far right column is proof that traditional 1 story condos are experiencing a declining share of total sold condos. This is especially true from 2023 on as affordability for traditional condos has been disproportionately harmful for buyers compared to their condo-ized counterparts. Once we see continued stabilization with mortgage rates, this will be interesting to monitor.

With interest rates and rapidly increasing HOA dues, traditional condos will continue to be a struggle from an affordability standpoint. Even outside of those factors, homeowner associations are also struggling to keep up with rising insurance costs and overall inflation where special assessments might become more common place. This is the void condo-ized units can potentially fill.

Onto the stats!

For January 2025 the median sale of a Seattle condo was $689,975, an all time record. This was up 28.4% YoY and up MoM from $550,000. Inventory was still up big time. 51.9% YoY and the months of inventory rose to 4.37 months from 2.98 in December.

Onward!

Danny Greco 1/16/25 Danny Greco 1/16/25

The December doldrums. The Greater Seattle housing market update, January 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle housing market, the first report for 2025! As always, you can watch the stats portion of this letter via video by clicking here. I'd recommend continuing to read below for superior information and context.

The past few months I've been warning about what I've described as "the calm before the storm". The housing market is a sleeping giant in late Q3 and Q4. Buyers are disengaged, inventory is relatively high, and activity is overall pretty dormant. That all changes once the year turns over and the market suddenly wakes up and jumps into action. And that's exactly what I've seen, anecdotally, so far in 2025.

It happens all so fast. Within a matter of weeks we depart a market where listings were getting minimal activity, buyers were casually looking but not ready to commit, then, like a snap of the finger, we enter a market where suddenly showing activity is robust and buyers are gobbling up inventory at a feverish pace.

This is my shocked face. Consider me unimpressed. I'll cover this increasingly competitive market in the next few months of updates.

As for now, let's look back at some interesting reflections on the local 2024 housing market. It's been a wild one.

Outside of 2023, 2024 had the lowest amount of King County homes sales since 2011. In fact, outside of 2010-11, the absolute bottom of the housing market, 2023-24 were the worst years (at least as far back as my software allows me to track). It's especially interesting considering 2021 was the highest amount of home sales in this time period. To go from decade highs to lows worth of home sales, all within the span of 2 years, is absolutely nuts.

As far as national numbers go, I've heard 2024 was the most depressed market since the mid 1990's. That is really something considering how many more people we have in the country now compared to 30 years ago. Real estate has truly been in a recession for almost 3 years. The saying last year was "survive til '25". I don't know that 2025 will be much, if any, better. We shall see!

And it's been no secret as to the reason for that. See mortgage rates below during the same timespan.

For those of you who are homeowners, here's an exercise that might make you a little sick. Go here and see what the estimated monthly payment would be on your home if you had to buy it at today's price and interest rates.

Did anybody else throw up in their mouth? My own mortgage payment would triple! This is precisely the obstacle for sellers in today's market, realizing just how challenging affordability is for many buyers.

Yet, despite housing affordability remaining near all time lows, Seattle area single family home values barely flinched. In fact, in 2024 home values accomplished something that's never been done. The median King County SFR sales price was $900,000 or higher in all but 2 months of the year (January and December). That includes hitting an all time high of $1,001,000 in June (the first time ever the median sale price eclipsed $1m). This is truly remarkable and speaks to the resiliency and power of our local housing market.

BREAKING NEWS: As I'm in the middle of this report, I'm learning that META (Facebook) just announced a layoff of 5% of it's workforce. I don't see where those jobs are located (I'd assume mostly in the Bay Area), but it's possible some are in the Seattle area. More locally, Redfin also just laid off 46 employees, too. Not to be outdone, but their competitor, Zillow, also announced layoffs. If/how this impacts the local housing market will remain to be seen. I doubt these collective layoffs will make much, if any, impact, but I'm already hearing of some local buyers pausing their home search until they get more clarity in the security of their employment.

As discussed in last month's report, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell's One Seattle Plan, aimed at increasing density by rezoning many neighborhoods in Seattle to make them conducive for multi-story and multi-family buildings, is still progressing. If you'd like to comment, and/or keep track of how this is progressing, click here. As the co-president of my neighborhood community council, we're getting LOTS of questions from neighbors.

Onto the stats:

Seattle: 2024 ended with a December median sale price of $898,900. That is up 5.75% YoY yet down MoM from $968,000. Total inventory was up 11.9% YoY, yet the months of inventory statistic fell to 1.42 months from 1.79 months.

Eastside: December 2024 median sale price of $1,545,000. That is up 7.29% YoY and up just slightly, MOM by $8,000. Total inventory was up 21.6% YoY and the months of inventory statistic increased slightly MoM to 1.24 months from 1.17.

King County: December 2024 median sale price of $875,000. That is up 2.95% YoY and down MoM from $925,000. Total inventory was up 21.28% YoY, but the months of inventory statistic fell to 1.28 months from 1.49.

Thank you all again for an amazing 2024. I enjoy creating this report for you each month and hope you get even a smidge of value out of it. Best of luck in 2025.

Onward!

Danny Greco 1/16/25 Danny Greco 1/16/25

Amazon to the rescue? The Seattle condo market update, January 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Seattle condo market update. As always, you can jump right to the stats by clicking here. To get the best out of the data with context, I urge you to continue reading below.

As of earlier this month, Amazon's RTO (return to office) mandate has been in effect requiring employees to work from the office 5 days a week. Just like the old days, remember those?!? This should hardly come as a surprise as Amazon had been gradually requiring workers back after granting WFO orders during the height of the pandemic fueled shutdown. A voluntary return then changed to a hybrid model and now we're back to RTO 5 days a week.

Some have opined with conspiracies as to the real motivation for this mandate. Some of my favorites have been:

This was a politically greased move. The city of Seattle and their leaders colluded with Amazon to require workers back to the office in order to help revitalize downtown businesses and culture.

My favorite conspiracy suggests that the mandate was calculated to induce resignations. Rather than announce layoffs, which is never good for employees or employers, perhaps requiring everybody back to the office 5 days a week, a move Amazon knew was already unpopular with many of their employees, would induce those employees into resigning, thus avoiding having to execute layoffs themselves? That doesn't sound too crazy.

Whether or not there's some truth to these conspiracies, we might never know, but this mandate could very well be the spark needed to ignite a resurgence in the downtown Seattle condo market. A resurgence that's badly needed.

The years of 2023 and 2024 were the LOWEST number of condos sold in the downtown core (downtown, Belltown, lower Queen Anne, Capitol Hill, First Hill, etc) since 2010-11! For those of you unfamiliar with ancient history, 2010-11 was the absolute bottom of the housing market due to the Great Financial Crisis imploding a few years prior.

The median days on market for a downtown core condo reached 40 days twice in 2024. While you may be thinking that doesn't sound that bad, keep in mind this is just data on the condos that did sell. MANY, hundreds, if not thousands of condos were listed in 2024 that never ended up selling. Perhaps a better figure would be to look at the months of inventory stat.

Remember how rough 2020 was for the downtown condo market and all the headwinds sellers faced then? 2024 pretty much told 2020 to "hold my beer". Not that downtown conditions were anywhere as out of control as they were in 2020, but for one reason or another, buyer demand faded and the months of inventory statistic reflected this. Only one month in 2020 was there a month of higher inventory than 2024 (August 2020 4.9 vs August 2024 4.7).

More abstractly, there were roughly 33% fewer sales in 2023 and 2024 (averaged) than in 2020. Furthermore, total sales in 2010-11 (averaged) were only 26.5/units more per year than in 2023-24. That's barely 2 sales a month! This, I believe, is 100% related to affordability.

I believe that condos have been disproportionately impacted by the housing unaffordability crisis relative to single family homes. Even if we assume values are stagnant (not necessarily the case, let's just assume that's the reality) HOA dues in many buildings have skyrocketed to cover increases in taxes and insurance. This is in addition to mortgage rates remaining elevated (currently we're hovering near 7 month highs with rates averaging 7.25-7.5% for owner occupied condos). What does downtown living offer to offset such a significant expense? Perhaps proximity to an office one is required to spend 40 hours/week at? As Amazon goes, maybe the rest of the tech industry follows?

That being said, as I'm in the middle of this report, I'm learning that META (Facebook) just announced a layoff of 5% of it's workforce. I don't see where those jobs are located (I'd assume mostly in the Bay Area), but it's possible some are in the Seattle area. More locally, Redfin also just laid off 46 employees, too. Not to be outdone, but their competitor, Zillow, also announced layoffs. If/how this impacts the local housing market will remain to be seen. I doubt these collective layoffs will make much, if any, impact, but I'm already hearing of some local buyers pausing their home search until they get more clarity in the security of their employment.

Onto the stats: The median priced Seattle condo in December 2024 was $550,000. That was down 6% YoY and down MoM from $575,000. Inventory YoY was up 40.9%, yet the months of inventory settled at 2.98 months, which is down from 4.15 the month prior. In fact, the months of inventory has not been this low since March.

One final thing to report: Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell's One Seattle Plan, aimed at increasing density by rezoning many neighborhoods in Seattle to make them conducive for multi-story and multi-family buildings, is still progressing. If you'd like to comment, and/or keep track of how this is progressing, click here. As the co-president of my neighborhood community council, we're getting LOTS of questions from neighbors and it's good info for all Seattleites to have.

I hope you had an amazing holiday, New Year, and have an awesome 2025 planned.

Danny Greco 5/28/19 Danny Greco 5/28/19

Seattle goes vertical. The Greater Seattle housing market update, December 2024

As the title suggests, the city of Seattle is going vertical! This isn't exactly new, but they're trying to go even more vertical than before.

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle Housing Market Update. As always, to skip right to the stats you can do so by clicking here. But for more valuable information, continue reading below!

As the title suggests, the city of Seattle is going vertical! This isn't exactly new, but they're trying to go even more vertical than before.

With the passage of last year's House Bill 1110, residential lots within Seattle are now permitted to accommodate 3 units (on a single family lot). You've likely seen these, or remember me mentioning them in past market updates. These new structures are being referred to as "condominium-ized" properties. The Council, Mayor, and other legislatures are considering an amendment to the proposal that would not only allow for 4 units per lot (possibly more in some situations), but also allow for greater diversity in the types of structures that can be constructed on these lots.

If you're a Seattle resident, not only can you learn more about the proposed changes, but you can also comment on them by going here. Even if not a Seattleite, I'd encourage taking a peek. It's pretty interesting stuff.

Some highlights of the current proposal:

- A max of 4 units are allowed on all lots, regardless of lot size, and up to SIX lots if the property is located within a quarter mile walk of major transit OR if two of the six units are "affordable". What exactly affordable means, I've yet to find.

- Lot coverage would increase to 50%, compared to 35-40% for most lots today. This would help accommodate two story buildings, which are less common today because the current lot coverage limit requires three-story buildings to achieve the maximum FAR (floor to area ratio).

- Front and rear setbacks would be reduced, which would allow a wider range of layouts and more usable open spaces. New rules would encourage porches by allowing them in the front setback.

- Unit lot subdivision would be permitted, allowing a more straightforward, fee simple sale and ownership of homes, compared to the more complex condominium-ized arrangements currently in use. Editorial opinion, this would be fantastic!

- Depending on the zoning, new requirements could increase the maximum number of stories per structure. For example, anything zoned LR-2 will potentially allow a structure up to four stories high. LR-3 will allow up to five stories. NC2-55 will allow a mix of retail, office, residential, etc and to a maximum 55ft height limit.

Let the arguments, name calling, and brawling begin!

Pro-density proponents will advocate this will help to bring down housing costs by adding more supply to the market. I don't disagree, but would recommend they temper their expectations on how impactful these changes will be. It's not like this bill will pave the way for $400,000 starter homes or anything close to it. Whatever is constructed will still be expensive, and if there's relief provided, I'm of the opinion it's more likely to be felt by renters as opposed to home buyers. At least that's what appears to be the effects of the current HB-1110.

Opponents might argue these buildings are likely to take away from the aesthetic character of their neighborhoods, possibly bringing down resale value. I don't 100% disagree, but also think this is an overreaction. You can get ideas on what some of these 4-5 stories look like and I think they're pretty sharp! Additionally, here's what we do know. If your lot is capable of being developed into a multi-unit site, you're lucky. Developers will pay premiums for lots that can offer this potential so it benefits the homeowner financially when they're ready to sell because not only is the property going to be desirable for buyers looking to buy the home and occupy it for themselves, but it will also be appealing to developers. The more buyers, regardless of their intentions with the property, the more likely that home can sell for more and more.

The reality is that, in some areas of Seattle, lots are pretty small (under 4,000sqft). Even assuming this amendment passes and these changes take place, it's not like every single family lot will suddenly be conducive to development. And even the ones that do, maybe some homeowners won't want to sell to a developer. Or, maybe when they're ready to sell, their agent doesn't understand the full scope of possibilities that can be done with that lot and therefore miss out on marketing to developers. Whether you're a proponent or opponent, I'd recommend taking a deep breath because change does not happen overnight.

Especially when it comes to building in Seattle, a city infamous for excessive regulation. This directly impacts building costs and timelines. If the city really wants to accelerate the impacts of this initiative, they're going to have to loosen up regulations, especially when it comes to tree preservation.

The regulation involved in which trees can be removed to create housing has essentially created an ideological tug of war between housing affordability and tree preservation advocates. Can both exist, or does one have to concede to the other in order to maximize the effects of this amendment? The city needs to decide which is a stronger priority.

One thing is for certain, we need more homes. King county added over 30,000 new residents over the last year, 18,000+ of which settled in Seattle. If roughly 3 out of every 5 new King County residents settle in Seattle, and we have NO LAND on which to build new inventory, we need to do everything we can with existing land to create more inventory. Personally, I don't think we'll ever get ahead of the curve given our region is so far behind building (and limited topographically) and we have an amazing regional economy attracting highly educated, skilled, and strong wage demanding populations to settle here, from all over the world. Pending any major natural disasters and/or massive regional economic shakeups (god forbid), I forever see our housing dynamics as being in one version of a seller's market or another.

Onto the stats:

Seattle: November 2024 median sale price of $968,000. That is up 2.5% YoY and down slightly MoM from $972,500. Inventory is up 12.6% YoY while the months of inventory statistic was flat MoM.

Eastside: November 2024 median sale price of $1,537,312. That is up 9.8% YoY and down slightly MoM from $1,555,000. Total inventory was up just .6% YoY and months of inventory declined to 1.17 from 1.28 months.

King County: November 2024 median sale price of $925,000. That is up 4.5% YoY and down MoM from $960,000. Inventory is up 14.2% YoY while the months of inventory statistic dropped to 1.49 months from 1.58.

Have a wonderful Holiday season and New Years. See you in 2025! Onward!

Danny Greco 5/28/19 Danny Greco 5/28/19

Optimism wanted. The Seattle condo market update, December 2024

November 2024 wasn't the most dramatic month within the Seattle condo market. To be fair, Q4 is never really too dramatic regardless of the year as we see inventory decrease. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that buyer demand follows the same downward trajectory.

Welcome to the latest edition of The Seattle Condo Market Update. As always, to skip the detailed info and go straight to the stats, you can do so by clicking here. Otherwise, to get the most out of this update, continue reading below!

That piqued my interest, too.

As it turns out, November saw the second highest number of condo units enter pending status in the last 5 months. And we all know why October's numbers stand out, right? Right?

That's because mortgage rates in September hit 18 month lows! Those buyers got off the fence and into contract in October closing either that month, or in November. We have to go back to 2021 to see a November with more units sold than this last month.

Anyone who's been reading my reports understands the challenges the condo resale market has experienced over the past number of years. Some areas (the downtown core) more than others. I've not held back in identifying some of those headwinds including 20 year high mortgage rates, cost prohibitive HOA dues, restrictive HOA rules and regulations, the work from home trend pushing residents out of city cores and into the suburbs, etc. No need to rehash any of that.

Instead, let's look to end 2024 on a positive note identifying some factors that could potentially contribute to a market turnaround.

Here are the stories/trends/headlines I'm watching in 2025:

In no particular order:

1) The return to office trend. We know that Amazon is requiring employees back to the office 5 days a week starting in January. Will others follow? I have to imagine this is a huge positive for the entire downtown commercial core. I'm sure there's some truth to the belief that, as Amazon goes, others will follow.

2) Mortgage rates. Not that I brand myself any kind of mortgage expert, but I never saw rates staying as persistently high as they have the past 2+ years. Looking into 2025, I've learned to temper my expectations for a significant drop so I'm anticipating they'll hover in the 6.5% range, more or less, throughout the year. Inflation, the labor market, geopolitical issues, these are major headlines to continue watching on how this affects the financial markets.

3) People continue to move here. This article from the Urbanist shows that last year King County gained 30,000 new residents, with 60% of them moving inside Seattle. Obviously not every new resident moving here buys immediately. In fact, I'd assume it's a very small number that do, but the more people we get migrating here to outpace those immigrating elsewhere continues to put more strain on our infrastructure of existing housing inventory. Generally a net positive for homeowners. Additionally, this article from Axios shows that the Seattle metro area was tops in the nation for economic growth. Note, this is not including the Boeing workers strike so that was not taken into account.

4) A sane Seattle City Council - Matthew Gardner, former chief economist at Windemere, put it accurately when he said at a recent conference I attended, "the wack-a-doos" are gone. Of course, he's referring to former council members who have since been replaced with more pragmatic representatives who are likely to reverse many of the issues that plagued the city over the past number of years and promote healthier, more business and resident friendly environments. Will they be given long enough terms to undo the damage done by their precedents? Let's hope so.

Onto the stats:

The median priced condo in Seattle for November 2024 was $574,950. That's down 1.3% YoY and down MoM from $580,000. Total active inventory was up 32% YoY while pendings and sold inventory were up 19.8% and 30.6%, respectively. The months of inventory statistic dropped MoM slightly to 4.15 months from 4.22.

Have a wonderful holiday season and new year. Onward!