That said, a year ago none of these would have made the MLS as distressed listings.

“There are 88 total for King County as Active, 79 as Pending and Sold.
That is a lot. ”

Out of over 30,000 listings in King County, that isn’t a lot…

Less than 3 tenths of one percent.

Thanks, Dave. Interesting.

BTW, drove by your listing on the west side of QA. You gotta talk some sense into that seller.

Bili. I thought the same thing when I saw that listing and noticed it was Mr. Losh’s.

For those wondering about the listing, here it is. Perhaps the added exposure will help turn up a buyer.

BTW, drove by your listing on the west side of QA. You gotta talk some sense into that seller.

Not very many short sales listed in comparison as to how everyone is talking on this site.

Can another agent verify my findings?

“We don’t anticipate a collapse or the steep price declines that are being forecast for other areas of the country,” Johnson said. YEAH RIGHT

http://www.bellinghamherald.com/business/story/458651.html

And I have not met anyone here in Florida that has visited Seattle that does not ask: “what ? you lived there? What the heck are you doing here???”

Well, I am a Seattle native, as are my three sisters. I live in Portland and am the northernmost outpost of my family unit. They are all in the Bay Area, Laguna Beach, and San Diego, respectively, and none of them would consider a move to Seattle a promotion. They all would call it a move to hell. See, they like sunshine.

Driver’s license data indicate that over time California contributes the largest share, from 40 percent to 50 percent, of the net movement into Washington from other states. The current 12-month license total of in-movers from California is 27,900 licenses. This compares to 38,000 in 2006 and a peak of about 40,000 licenses from California in the early 1990s.

Considering the vast majority of population growth from within the US is from California, their cratering market and next few years of declines/stagnation will probably effect Seattle quite a bit. I am a silicon valley renter who is moving back to Seattle for a new job and the recruiter was incredibly relieved I did not own a home, she said they had a lot of people from the valley backing out of offers because they were unable to sell and move without losing a bundle.

I worked with many Texans that sold their ranches and moved to Seattle to work in my former company (back in the 90s). They spent all their time "female dogging" about not being able to afford anything in Seattle. Don’t worry; I was told that by the early 2000s, they were all back in Texas.

In conclusion, a recession will affect Seattle’s population more than other cities. Most growth has been job related. 9 months without sun PLUS struggling to make the mortgage payment ….people will go back to where they came from.

In both the biotech and software industries, Seattle is a second- or third-rate player. Unless you’re brand new, your career will benefit from moving to the bay area (for both software and biotech) or San Diego (for biotech). There’s simply no comparison.

Once again, the delusional, “Seattle is special” locals overestimate their worth in the free market….

And Seattle weather is not “senior friendly” (they wear jackets when temperatures drop to 78 here in Florida).

it is an interesting situation, this increasing joblessness amongst teens thing, but i can’t see a way to explain it as an overpopulation issue.

it seems to be more likely it is some combination of the following:
1) old folks didn’t save enough to retire, instead relying on their house or social security, or just choosing to not think about it
2) social security benefits are based on the CPI, which consistently underestimates the costs of things, so the real value of social security benefits decrease every year
3) businesses don’t want old people as full time employees because they increase the cost of health insurance too much, so they encourage them to retire or don’t hire them
4) many old people don’t have skill sets that are valued by the economy

because of these reasons, old people have to compete with young for part time jobs. since most of these jobs are in the retail industry, i doubt that illegal immigrants are really having much impact.

US News & World Report, 7/14/08 Issue, “Occupying Idle Teen Hands” by Bret Schulte reports our kids can’t find jobs this summer. The reason is given, and the article states in part:

“…The problem is partly due to the weakening of a federal summer summer jobs program but also to immigrants competing for low skilled jobs…”

It also mentions our retirees going back to work too at these jobs, ’cause they can’t afford to live in America’s hyper inflation anymore.

Overpopulation in America is real and its not a joke either, especially if you’re in today’s job market.

It is true that the Soylent Green factory is having trouble retaining staff. What’s weird is that people clock in at the beginning of their shift but they never clock out or show up for their shift the next day.

folks from the midwest especially like the jobs and the higher pay, but just can’t imagine paying so much for a house.

Soylent Green.

Where has everyone gone? It’s not as if we hear of people running to Detroit, Cleveland or Chicago.

I suppose that some of this population fluctation could result from foreign immigrants (legal or otherwise) returning to their home countries. But I wonder if there might be some flaw in the statistical gathering of population data? Maybe we over-estimate the number of people living in homes or something?