Seattle Real Estate is almost a misnomer in that sections of Seattle Home Prices do not move in unison. The highest performing area seems to be between Downtown and 85th to the North of Downtown (just above Green Lake).

Of particular interest when doing the most recent Seattle Home Price stats through 3rd quarter of 2009, is that bank-owned property and short sales sold higher on a price per square foot than “regular” sales.  So be careful not to overbid the “bargains”.

I expect the 2008 market will be short, if there is “a market” at all. 

When a year passes through with people buying and selling, but no real change in value up or down, it was just another year. 

If the months from March through August create an upswing and the months from September through February provide an equal downswing, you end up where you started off.  Much of that is because investors and bargain hunters tend to buy in the off months and better homes tend to sell in Spring and Summer. 

It’s like the ebb and flow of the tide, like the yin and yang of the valuation process.

I think 2008 will come and go in that manner.  2007 had more pull back and forth during these times, a bit more dramatic than 2008 in terms of numbers of property sold, if not value and pricing.

No matter where you live, there is an “imaginary neighborhood” with “imaginary lines”.  While these neighborhoods only exist in the minds of the residents, and you won’t find them in a book or on a map, they are very real, and greatly impact the value or lack thereof, of real estate.  A good/bad example for those trying to sell their homes, is when you live in the “right zip code, but wrong town” or in the “right school district, but wrong zip code”.

Here on “The Eastside”, some of the people who work at Microsoft, have created a value-based artifical “neighborhood” that I call “The Zone“.  The residents of this “neighborhood” are then, of course, called “The Zonies”.  Zonies being a sub-set, if you will, of “Microsoftees”.  I don’t like the term Microsoftees, though I hear it often, because people who work at Microsoft…are anything BUT soft, for sure.  Property values in “the Zone” are affected greatly by the supply and demand factor of people who work at Microsoft wanting to live near where they work.  Given the number of Microsoft employees, it is pretty safe to say that their actions greatly impact, and to a large extent control, the values in this “zone”.

The primary purpose of this post is to answer this email:

“I saw your post in reply to ‘Sandy’ on the (RainCityGuide) blog. I am taking the liberty of writing directly to you since I had similar questions to the ones Sandy had posted. I hope that is not a problem. I want to clarify first that I am thinking about buying a home in 2007. I dont have an agent as yet. I am trying to understand what is going on now in real estate market here and basically talk to some people who have credible experience and hence my email to you. My questions are below:

1.  I would like to buy a house in Redmond. In the past 2 years I have seen prices climb at almost record levels in Redmond. Since I am planning on buying soon, do you expect prices to fall in the next 2 years in the Redmond area? This would be key question I guess.

2. I do see signs that say the price is reduced now cropping up on some houses. Is that a bad sign for the market?

3. I am also debating new construction versus older home. I find (from my limited search and preferences) that I would prefer a new construction or a relatively new home to a home that is 30 years or so older. I have found some cases of new construction priced in the high 500’s for a 2000 to 2200sqft. Is there room for appreciation in such properties?

4. How can one estimate the property taxes on a new home in Redmond area? How can we estimate home owner’s insurance payments?

5. Is it wise to use the buyer’s agent as the seller’s agent as well? What are the common pitfalls here?”

All good questions, and Sandy and “Pete” are not the only two people out there who have these same questions.   I will answer questions 2 thorough 5 here, and answer question #1 on  “The Ardell Blog”,   

Let’s “begin with the end in mind” by answering the last question, first.  Generally speaking, the answer to

Question #5 is yes.  But limit the listing contract to sixty days.  You can usually save thousands of dollars by negotiating the listing fee on the sale of your current home, if you agree to both buy and sell with the same agent.  So it’s worth a shot to save a lot of money, but give yourself a chance to rethink that after 60 days, if the home you are selling is not yet in escrow.  Other advantage to using the same agent, is they can then best coordinate the two escrows so the money flows from one closing to the other, without the need for a bridge loan.  More savings.  I haven’t had any pitfalls, so can’t name them.  Works for me.

Question #4 – Take 1% of the purchase price, divide by 12 and add that to your monthly payment  It should be a tad high, but better to over estimate, than to under estimate.  Use $75 a month for homeowner’s insurance, unless you buy a house in a flood zone.  Again, that may be a bit high, but $20 one way or the other shouldn’t make much difference.  You can be too exacting regarding monthly payment because interest rates change dramatically, unless you have 20% down.  So don’t try to fine tune it to the nth degree.

Question #3 Know this, just like a new car, a new house will depreciate the minute you live in it, the same as when you drive a new car off the lot.  That being said, in a flat to down market, new construction will suffer more than resale.  That being said, you still have to buy what you want to live in, regardless.  There are a few precautions you can take to better the odds.  Buying new construction is VERY TRICKY!  Don’t get lost in the pick the options and upgrades room.  Factor location within the new community or building first and forements.  This is the biggest mistake people who buy new construction make.  On Resale…location becomes more important and can kill you.  Generally speaking, it’s like going to a sale where there are only two shirts left on the sale table…not likely they are the best the store had to offer, or they wouldn’t be the only ones left…if you catch my drift.

Question #2 Price reductions are not a sign of market strength or weakness.  Price reductions are simply reflecting the fact that the seller over priced the house when it was listed.  If a house would have sold at $550,000 and the seller was asking $659,000, there will need to be a price reduction in order for that house to be sold.  That can happen in any market.  Until you see a house in a good location and in good showing condition, selling for less than the comps, and we are not seeing that here in the Seattle area, price reductions are simply a function of an improperly priced home.

Question #1 is answered HERE, as it is the one most often asked by many.

I just returned from Calabria and I had a wonderful evening.  I highly recommend it.  We had a wonderful evening.  Great food, great music and great company!

Thanks Anne and Rex!   

I’ve decided to change the name of this blog to augment www.SearchingSeattleBlog.com

Kirkland already has some fabulous area blogs and honestly, I love living in Kirkland, but there just aren’t enough things for me to say about Kirkland to create a dynamic blog.  Mostly because I can’t point to the homes for sale here and say which houses are great, which are overpriced, which are good investments, etc…  I’d love to, but it isn’t fair to my clients or the homeowners at large for me to do that. 

I will, of course, talk about Kirkland as well as Seattle and other Eastside locations.  Lots of ARDELL blogs, different strokes for different folks. I’ll find a “theme” for this one. 

The big news is still the Car Show this Sunday. 

I couldn’t get this great shot of a 1957 Chevy in here for some reason so I’m cross linking it HERE.  I added a stop by my Open House on the “other” blog to legitimize the entry’s presence on my Real Estate Blog

There we go!  That color is clearly not for everyone…

Pop over to the Kirkland Weblog and post your comments to this article regarding tax dollars funding “Wireless in the Park”.  I don’t go to the park, so don’t have strong opinions one way or the other.  I like having a “small town” atmosphere with “high tech” advantages, based just on principle.  Figure it costs me about a penny as a local taxpayer, so to City Council, I say Go For It!

Downtown Kirkland – Classic Car Show – Don’t Miss it!

It is my absolute favorite Kirkland Annual Event…Hands Down!

Just click on the hyperlinks below for scads of Kirkland info. 

For my own benefit, as well as yours, I am going to list some links to my favorite Kirkland oriented places.  I may pop in a few Seattle ones as well.  I try to keep most real estate advice posts on my main site Ardell’s Seattle Area Real Estate Blog, so there are more ones of area interest.  Also check out Rain City Guide for additional writings on Seattle Area Real Estate by Ardell and others.

The Kirkland Downtown Association Site is chock full of current event info and other usefull info.

The events calendar on the City of Kirkland Official Site, fills in some blanks to the KDL one above.

The Wikipedia on Kirkland is a good overall info source, and the Wikipedia in general is a great reasource for most anything.  This link should provide a permanent link to today’s featured article on Microsoft.

If you are looking for property for sale in Kirkland, try my site for searching property for sale or this nifty site where you click on Washington and then double click on Seattle, then double click on Bellevue to find Kirkland.  These three City links will bring you to the newspapers for each area and the Kirkland link will give you access to Queen Anne and some other Seattle Neighborhoods as well.

This blog is clearly my favorite Kirkland Blog but it is getting much harder to find in the Search Engines for some reason than it was in the past.  So I’m putting a link to it here for both me and you.

We don’t have too many hotels in Kirkland, so I’ll post this link to the Woodmark and this one for short term rentals at The Villagio.  Actually more of my clients have stayed in Downtown at the Westwater just past the intersection of Lake and Central for short term needs, but I can’t find a good link to that.  So call me at 206-910-1000 if you want some info on that one or email me at ARDELL@SoundRealty.biz.

As I was driving home yesterday, I saw a for sale sign on this well known Kirkland House.  It was recently featured in Seattle Homes Magazine and was built in 2003.  It’s one of those homes you can’t miss as it is so completely different from other homes in Kirkland.  It has always been one of Kim’s favorites and surprisingly one of his daughter’s favorites as well.  Kim and his daughter did not grow up together, so it always amazes me when their tastes meld in that fashion.

I was hoping to go to and report back on Broker’s Open Houses tomorrow, but I have a home inspection scheduled at 10 a.m.  

I prefer to search better on msn than Google and my stats for my “regular” blog Ardell’s Seattle Area Real Estate Blog seem to be falling that way.  But a surprising number of people come through Yahoo Search even though I don’t seem to search there as well.  In any event, this paragraph is added to comply with Dustin’s advice on Rain City Guide this morning.