It’s time for our regularly-scheduled check on NWMLS statistics from around the sound. Once again, courtesy Tableau Software, the Around the Sound update is rocking exclusive interactive data visualizations.
As usual, all of the underlying data and the old charts can be downloaded in Excel 2007 (or in Excel 2003 format), so if that’s the format you prefer, you can rest easy. For the rest of you, feel free to poke and prod our fancy new charts to your hearts’ content. To get specific info about a certain point on any graph, float your mouse pointer over the data.
Before we get to the cool stuff, here’s the usual table of YOY stats for each of our seven covered counties as of April 2009.
(Note: The “Sales” data below represents pending sales, not closed sales.)
(Additional Note: Certain NWMLS definitions were modified beginning July 2008 that affect the reported number of active listings and pending sales (and therefore the “months of supply”). The net result of this change is that active listings post 07/08 will appear lower, pending sales higher, and months of supply lower than prior to 07/08. See this post for more details.)
King – Price: -15.3% | Listings: -15.9% | Sales: +14.9% | MOS: 4.5
Snohomish – Price: -14.3% | Listings: -21.9% | Sales: +28.3% | MOS: 4.8
Pierce – Price: -15.0% | Listings: -25.2% | Sales: +23.5% | MOS: 4.8
Kitsap – Price: -11.9% | Listings: -27.9% | Sales: +45.4% | MOS: 4.8
Thurston – Price: -13.3% | Listings: -22.8% | Sales: -4.3% | MOS: 4.7
Island – Price: -9.8% | Listings: -14.1% | Sales: +7.5% | MOS: 9.7
Skagit – Price: -11.9% | Listings: -4.8% | Sales: -11.0% | MOS: 10.0
Whatcom – Price: -7.0% | Listings: -8.3% | Sales: +17.6% | MOS: 6.3
Summary
Hit the jump for the rest of the interactive charts.
The visualization below is comparable to our usual chart of closed sales in each county in April 2008 and April 2009:
Closed Sales
Closed sales once again experienced steep declines across the Sound in April. While “pending sales” have been surging for a couple months now, the boost has yet to be reflected in the actual number of homes sold.
Here’s our comparison of median prices in each county at their respective peaks and in April 2009:
Change from Peak
Island County once again took the top spot, as the median price there rapidly approachs a full third off the peak. Interestingly, the total declines in King, Snohomish, Pierce, and Kitsap all fell within one percentage point of each other, wiping out 100% of the equity of even those peak buyers who put 20% down.
Months of Supply
Unfortunately, this chart is fairly meaningless with the change in “pending” definition by the NWMLS. To give you an idea of how much the MOS data may be skewed by the change, consider the following end-of-month scenario: 10,000 active listings, 500 homes “subject to inspection,” and 1,800 homes “pending sale.” Under the old definitions, that counted as 10,500 “active listings” and 1,800 “pending sales,” resulting in 5.8 MOS. Under the new definition, that same scenario counts as 10,000 “active listings” and 2,300 “pending sales,” resulting in 4.3 MOS. Shifting the definition of 5% of the “active listings” results in an over 25% change in the “months of supply.”
Regardless of the definitions change, the data still seems to indicate a housing market around the sound that is seriously sluggish, with continued downward pressure on pricing.