Let’s check in again on our regular monthly neighborhood update to Seasonally-Adjusted Active Supply (SAAS). For an explanation of what seasonally-adjusted active supply is, please refer to this post. Also, you may view a map of the areas discussed in this post.
As usual, the sweet interactive data visualizations (new and improved!) in today’s post come to you courtesy Tableau Software.
In the charts below I have taken the calculated value for SAAS and subtracted 2, in order to better visualize the difference between a buyer’s market and a seller’s market. Using this method, negative SAAS values indicate a seller’s market, while positive values indicate a buyer’s market.
Summary
King County’s overall SAAS dropped further below the “balanced” level, coming in at 1.80 for September (August was 1.88). 11 of 30 areas came in below 1.75 as seller’s markets, 5 of 30 came in above 2.25 as buyer’s markets, and the remaining 14 were more or less balanced between 1.75 and 2.25.
Hit the jump for the rest of this month’s interactive charts and commentary.
Here’s a year-over-year comparison for each NWMLS neighborhood.
Year-Over-Year Comparison
Downtown Seattle condos still stick out like a bit of a sore thumb, coming in with an SAAS above 3.
Regional History
Most regions again saw declining SAAS values from August to September, probably due to the increasing number of sales that are being spurred by the tax credit. Further evidence that the tax credit may be heating up the market can be found in the fact that some of the cheapest parts of the county (down in the south) are seeing the largest drops in their SAAS.
The three toughest markets for sellers were Downtown Seattle condos (701) at 3.1, Enumclaw (300) at 2.4, and Central Seattle (380) at 2.4.
The three best markets for sellers as of last month were Vashon Island (800) at 1.3, East Bellevue (530) at 1.4, and East Lake Sammamish (540), at 1.5.
All these charts.. In essence I assume. The best bang for your buck is 701. Stay away from Ballard and Bellevue. Makes sense for me at least. I personally keep running into multiple offers in Bellevue and now Mercer Island.
Too much data overload for me, but I wonder what these numbers would look like if you eliminated short sales (but retained bank owned)? It’s too bad the NWMLS doesn’t provide such statistics. Maybe they will once the short sale indicator has been in place over a year.
RE: Kary L. Krismer @ 2 –
I Agree Kary
Another anomaly could be bank owned and purposely left unsold, hoping for higher futures.
This would keep the toxicity of lower sales prices off the bank’s present Q3 books longer too…
I keep my eye on Ballard and Crown Hill. We had to rent over by Ravenna but want to move back to Ballard. The prices have dropped a bit but it is still too high. Should we give up hope on Ballard? I have been told the reason Ballard and Crown Hill are still high is because of the new school busing rules that will start next year. Could schools be driving some areas to stay high?
Being able to interact with these charts is awesome!