It’s time once again to take an updated look at how King County’s sales are shifting between the different regions around the county, since geographic shifts can and do affect the median price.
In order to explore this concept, we break King County down into three regions, based on the NWMLS-defined “areas”:
- low end: South County (areas 100-130 & 300-360)
- mid range: Seattle / North County (areas 140, 380-390, & 700-800)
- high end: Eastside (areas 500-600)
Here’s where each region’s median prices came in as of May data:
- low end: $247,000-$437,000
- mid range: $348,500-$750,000
- high end: $503,000-$1,600,000
First up, let’s have a look at each region’s (approximate) median price (actually the median of the medians for each area within the region).
The median price in all the low tier rose between April and May, but fell in both the middle and high tiers. The low tier rose 4.5 percent in the month, the middle tier decreased 3.2 percent, and the high tier lost 1.3 percent. Meanwhile, the median price in all three tiers is still up year-over-year, although only just barely for the middle tier. Here’s how the median prices changed year-over-year. Low tier: +2.7%, middle tier: +0.2%, high tier: +5.2%.
Next up, the percentage of each month’s closed sales that took place in each of the three regions.
The share of sales in Seattle and the Eastside inched up in May, taking share from the low tier south county regions. Year-over-year sales were down in all three tiers, dropping 8.4 percent in the low tier, 6.3 percent in the middle tier, and 8.1 percent in the high tier.
As of May 2014, 32.0 percent of sales were in the low end regions, 35.2 percent in the mid range, and 32.8 percent in the high end. A year ago the mid range had less of the share and the low and high range more: In May 2013 the low end made up 32.3 percent of the sales, the mid range was 34.7 percent, and the high end was 33.0 percent.
Here’s that information in a visual format:
Finally, here’s an updated look at the percentage of sales data all the way back through 2000:
We’re still in relatively unusual territory with the middle tier taking up the largest share of homes, but overall this year there haven’t really been any dramatic shifts in the sales volume between regions.