Seattle Bubble Forum Archive

I have been watching the market for close to an year now. At this time, I'm thinking that I should buy...I've been looking at various new construction in Mill Creek area like Pacific Ridge, WoodCress, Camwest, etc.

Is it a good time to buy now? Did anyone buy in Mill Creek area recently? If so, have you got a good deal?

I believe Synthetic has good knowledge in this area. Synthetic, can you please help?

I have family that live up there and they love it. If you can do it without committing financial suicide then why not? Also, if the thought of losing some of your equity over the next few years would make you very worried then you should probably wait as the outlying areas tend to do the worse in a downturn.

Thanks for the replies.
I identified few houses, which I can afford to buy; but waiting for the dust to settle down. But noticed that slowly one by one the houses are being sold...makes me to wonder what I should be doing?

Wait for some more time as there is still good size of inventory, or jump in and buy. I'm really confused.

Wait. Seattle real estate prices, and the national economy as a whole, have just entered the first phase of what will be a several year downturn. Sure houses are still selling- not everyone is as informed and rational as you. But that doesn't mean now is a good time to buy.

Here's the bottom line in my opinion. Housing prices are certainly not very likely to go up any significant amount in the next year or two. But they may come down a very significant amount. There is very little risk that you will be priced out, but a pretty good chance you will loose tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of dollars by buying now. Wait- you have nothing to loose really, and much to save.

Silly, it's ALWAYS a good time to BUY!!!

Yes, we're only in the bottom of the first inning in this game, so stay tuned, much more action to follow! This is going to take a long time to unwind.

When you have politicians at all levels (city, state, national) proposing bailouts (which won't really fix anything, but merely slightly delay the inevitable), you just know we are screwed!

So if you find something you like later this year, can afford it under various 'worst-case' scenarios, and can afford to take a 10-20% (my own WAG) loss if for some reason you end up needing to sell sooner than planned and you are OK with that, I'd go ahead and pull the trigger. As has already been mentioned, there are many reasons, tangible and intangible, why one wants to be a homeowner (I am one, but only because I bought 10 years ago before prices went skyward). And if you have a family and/or lots of stuff, moving can be a huge pain, so renting may not be ideal from a stability standpoint (it can be, but depends on the situation).

The important thing is that you go into the transaction with your eyes open. I'd recommend reading all of the paperwork that you sign also--I spent close to two hours reading through all of the fine print on my loan before signing (I can't believe all of the things I'm not supposed to do, like keep any gasoline on the premises, guess I'll buy a goat for the lawn, oh, as long as the goat stays outside ).