Saturday, March 14, 2015

Should You Buy New or Existing?

Have Big Homes Topped Out?

·        Mar 13, 2015
·        Peter Miller
·        Home Prices & Sales
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The real estate market has slowed during the past year, a remarkable achievement given interest rates below 4 percent, prices nationwide which have yet to return the 2007 peak, and as much pent-up demand as anyone can imagine.
Not only does the real estate market remain fragile, the new-home market in particular has not come close to regaining its past allure. The advantages of new homes — modern technologies, new warranties, new appliances, and the ability to select models, colors and features — have simply been overwhelmed by costs.
In 2005 there were 1.283 million single-family new home sold but only 437,000 sales in 2014 while existing home sales went from 7.040 million in 2005 to 4.940 million in 2014.
In the case of both new and existing home sales there has been a huge contraction. Existing home sales are down 30 percent while new home activity dropped 63 percent.
The sale levels seen in 2005 are unlikely to be repeated for a very long time in large measure because many transactions back then were lubricated with toxic financing, loans which in fairly short order lead to a massive number of foreclosures and short sales. That said, new home sales have fallen a lot further than existing home transactions. Why? In large measure because of problems relating to price and size.
New Home Pricing
Back in 2005 the typical new home on average sold for $297,000, a figure that rose to $343,800 in 2014, an increase of $46,000.
The average price for an existing home amounted to $219,600 in 2005 versus $208,300 in 2014, a decline of $11,300.
Seen from the perspective of today’s buyer, the typical new home costs $135,500 more than an existing one. That’s a HUGE sales barrier and here’s why:
Buy a home for $343,800 with a 3.5 percent FHA loan and the down payment is $13,433. Buy an existing home for $208,300 with 3.5 percent down and the down payment is just $7,290 — a difference of better than $6,000 and a big deal in a nation which saves just 4.7 percent.
Now imagine that both properties can be financed at 3.8 percent fixed over 30 years. The new home buyer has a $370,367 mortgage and a required monthly payment for principal and interest of $1,725.75.
The existing home buyer has a $201,010 mortgage. With the same terms the monthly payment is $936.62.
The difference between the two loans is not only $789 per month, it also can be seen in the need for vastly more income to qualify for the larger loan required to purchase the new home, income a lot of people just don’t have.
To paraphrase the mantra of the day, “new homes just cost too damn much.”
Square Feet
But why are new homes so expensive?
No doubt some of the answer lies in rising costs for materials, labor and land. But another reason concerns size: When it comes to new homes size really does matter: The typical new home in 2005 averaged 2,434 sq. ft. By 2014 the same average house had grown to 2,607 sq. ft. In comparison the typical new home in 1975 had just 1,645 sq. ft.
You have to wonder: Are bigger houses the right way to increase new home sales? If the cost of a home is measured in part by square footage then it follows that more square feet equal more cost. Given the gap between new and existing home prices how is this a winning formula? Did people in 1975 with those modest 1,645 sq. ft. homes live in some sort of residential poverty or were those homes perfectly adequate for most owners?
The high prices for new homes has begun to spawn a small but visible interest in tiny houses, homes and apartments with just a few hundred square feet. Such properties are not a viable replacement for most residences, but every time one of them sells it’s one less opportunity to market a new or existing property.
Tiny houses are getting a lot of attention, properties which raise the question of whether today’s elephantine homes are either affordable or practical. Judging from the substantial decline in new home sales a lot of people plainly think that smaller and cheaper are better, and they’re saying so with the housing choices they make.
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Foreclosures in the greater Seattle vicinity.
·        MEDIAN LIST PRICE
$329,900
3$10,050 ) vs Dec 2013
·        MEDIAN SALES PRICE
$299,000
0$950 ) vs Dec 2013
·        MEDIAN FORECLOSURE SALES PRICE
$236,000
4$8,902 ) vs Dec 2013


Homes for Sale
319
Recently Sold
5,282
MARKET SUMMARY
There are currently (contact us for foreclosure counts) properties in Snohomish County, WA that are in some stage of foreclosure (default, auction or bank owned) while the number of homes listed for sale on RealtyTrac is 319. 

In January, the number of properties that received a
 foreclosure filing in Snohomish County, WA was 38% higher than the previous month and 8% higher than the same time last year.

Home sales for December 2014 were up 3% compared with the previous month, and up 5%compared with a year ago. The median sales price of a non-distressed home was $299,000. The median sales price of a 
foreclosure home was $236,000, or 21% lower than non-distressed home sales.

SALES PRICES - SNOHOMISH COUNTY, WA

·        FORECLOSURE DISCOUNT
$63,000 ( 21.1% )
13.5% ( $9,852 ) vs Dec 2013

Highest Availability 
200-300K/412 Properties

Saturday, February 28, 2015

Seattle Rents Increase as Demand Grows



The last few years have seen average yearly rent increase as much as 8% and projections are for 2015 to still be high but around 6%. Although over 35,000 new units will become available it is still not meeting demand. As of January, 2015, average apartment rent within 10 miles of Seattle is $1702. One bedroom apartments in Seattle rent from $1300 to $1850 and two bedroom apartments average $1926.

Over the year, the average rent has risen by $94 or 7.9 percent accelerating from a 6.8 percent annual gain in the first quarter according to Seattle-based Apartment Insights Washington. Those averages mask a wide range of rents: At $1,912 a month, West Bellevue had the highest overall rent, an annual increase of 6.4 percent. Downtown Seattle ranks the highest on a per-square-foot basis, at $2.43, up 5.7 percent from the first quarter. The lowest rents are in SeaTac ($901) and Des Moines ($923).

But Ballard also had a vacancy rate of 8.6 percent, the highest in Seattle. And when new apartments that just opened are included, the vacancy rate shoots up to 18 percent.Apartments in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood saw the biggest increase in rents. The average asking rent was 12.3 percent higher over the quarter, rising to $1,628. Properties in King and Snohomish counties built before 1950 raised rents in the second quarter 5.2 percent, more than any of the more recent vintage properties, Apartment Insights’ data shows.

The apartment boom in Ballard has led to a doubling of the inventory over the past six years, said Tom Cain, head of Apartment Insights Washington. When the units now being built are complete, Ballard’s inventory will have quadrupled.

New units rent for a premium, and they’re part of what’s driving up market rents, Cain said. Across King and Snohomish counties, the average apartment rent in a property built since 2010 was $1,754, while the average rent in a property built in the 1970s was $1,019. As some tenants trade up for newer apartments, landlords of older properties may be able to raise rents, too.