Here’s yet another sign that we’re back in bubble territory, albeit a strictly anecdotal one. During the last bubble it was nearly impossible to turn on the radio without hearing some form of scammy “riches in flipping” ad during the commercial break. I don’t listen to the radio that often, but in the rare instances…
Price to Income Ratio Back in Bubble Territory
It has been a while since we last looked at one of our primary housing bubble metrics: local home prices compared to incomes. In the next chart I am using the Case-Shiller Home Price Index for the Seattle area (which rolls together King, Snohomish, and Pierce counties) and Bureau of Economic Analysis data on per…
Seattle-Area Unemployment Dips to Previous Boom Levels
We haven’t taken a look at the jobs data in a while, so lets update those charts through June. In this series we look at how the Seattle area’s unemployment rate and approximate labor participation rate stack up to the national numbers. [July 24 Update – The chart above and numbers below have been updated…
Despite Red-Hot Housing Market, One in Five Pending Sales Still Fail to Close
With another quarter fully in the books, let’s take a look a the latest data on pending sales volume versus closed sales volume. For this series I roll the pending sales and closed sales data up by quarter, with pending sales offset by one month. In other words, the second quarter numbers below represent pending…
Sales Mix Shifted Into Expensive Eastside Homes in June
With the big increase in the county-wide median price between May and June, let’s take an updated look at how King County’s sales are shifting between the different regions around the county. This data is interesting to keep tabs on since geographic shifts can and do affect the median price. In order to explore this…