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 June data:
- low end: $256,000-$422,500
- mid range: $384,000-$702,500
- high end: $490,000-$1,344,000
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 the low and middle tiers actually fell between June and July. Only the high tier (Eastside) rose, and only just slightly. The low tier fell 2.3 percent in the month, the middle tier decreased 1.5 percent, and the high tier gained 0.9 percent. Meanwhile, the median price in all three tiers is still up year-over-year. Twenty-five of the twenty-nine NWMLS regions in King County with single-family home sales in July had a higher median price than a year ago, while just fourteen had a month-over-month increase in the median price.
Here’s how the median prices changed year-over-year. Low tier: up 3.9 percent, middle tier: up 1.3 percent, high tier: up 12.0 percent.
Next up, the percentage of each month’s closed sales that took place in each of the three regions.
The share of sales in the low and middle tiers of South King and Seattle both lost ground in July, while the Eastside surged up. Year-over-year sales were up in the low and high tiers and down in the middle tier. Compared to a year ago, sales increased 4.9 percent in the low tier, fell 7.2 percent in the middle tier, and rose 5.2 percent in the high tier.
As of July 2014, 31.5 percent of sales were in the low end regions (up from 30.2 percent a year ago), 32.8 percent in the mid range (down from 35.6 percent a year ago), and 35.7 percent in the high end (up from 34.2 percent a year ago).
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:
The Eastside has rarely made up this large a percentage of the sales in a given month. Much of the big spike in the county-wide median price last month can likely be attributed to a shift in sales toward the more expensive neighborhoods on the Eastside.