Trade up house
I currently own a home in ballard that Zillow says is worth just under $900K, which I think is actually fairly accurate, if not just a little low.
Perhaps a little shallow, as my home is enough for our family, but I would like a bigger house with a view. At current market prices, I'm assuming a 1.25-1.4M range based on what the selling price has been for a few homes similar to what I would like. (One house that started all of this went for 1.3M, and was $150K+ over the list.
1) I don't like risk. How the heck can someone move up a notch in homes these days in Seattle? It seems like making a contingent offer would not be too successful in the age of bidding wars, and you would need to sell your home first, and then gamble you would find a home you like.
2) This is a want, not a need. Should I just wait until market dynamics return to a more normal state of market dynamics? This would risk that the premium for views increases relative to my home.
Perhaps a little shallow, as my home is enough for our family, but I would like a bigger house with a view. At current market prices, I'm assuming a 1.25-1.4M range based on what the selling price has been for a few homes similar to what I would like. (One house that started all of this went for 1.3M, and was $150K+ over the list.
1) I don't like risk. How the heck can someone move up a notch in homes these days in Seattle? It seems like making a contingent offer would not be too successful in the age of bidding wars, and you would need to sell your home first, and then gamble you would find a home you like.
2) This is a want, not a need. Should I just wait until market dynamics return to a more normal state of market dynamics? This would risk that the premium for views increases relative to my home.
Comments
After maintaining optimism for a good while, I think I've finally accepted that what we want just isn't going to happen in this market. In our case, that's mostly because prices for what we've been looking at seem to have exploded this spring. We went to an open house in Maple Leaf (listed at $800k) about a month ago where we decided the house was nice, but wasn't really an upgrade over what we currently had and it closed in about 2 weeks at over a million. We have a pretty hefty down payment saved up where we could pay up to 40% down without selling first, but even with that the prices have gone beyond our comfortable reach. It feels like our comfort level with prices is perpetually a year or so behind where the market is.
As for advice, if you do decide to sell first, the level of demand means you could easily ask for a couple months of rent back so you have extra time to find what you want. So that's something. And it's not like nothing is coming on the market, it's just that it goes so fast you have to be willing to make a quick decision (although the inventory with a view may be fairly small, I don't know) and a quick decision is much easier when you've already sold. I guess this is obvious, but if you are actually regularly seeing things you like go for prices you can afford, then you can probably sell, then buy... at least if you can overcome the fear and pull the trigger. If that's not happening, I'd wait it out.
As for us, now that I've given up hope on the current market I'm debating what to do with that down payment money. Keep it handy for when the market changes (which could happen by the end of the year or in seven years for all I know), or use it to improve our current house and invest, etc...
Anyway, sorry for the extremely long and not very helpful post. Just venting to someone in a similar situation.
In the past 6 months there have been two houses that seemed to fit what I am wanting. One of them I went to the open house (the 1.3M) and liked it. The other I only saw the pictures, went for just over 1.4M It's hard to tell if the 1.4M house was really "it." but it did meet all of our criteria.
I was at a BBQ last weekend and some neighbors of the host were there too. We were chatting about the housing market, and I half jokingly told them they should sell their home to us when they move out. Surprisingly they said they would let us know if they did move out.
Good for you for having so much funds available for a 2nd down payment.