Seattle condo June market report: median price declines, inventory increases, buyer interest wanes
The numbers for what the Seattle condo market did in June are out and change is in the air. While we hit an all-time high for median price last month, the median price for a condo declined to $498,500 and will likely continue a downward trend as we see in June that sellers listed many more condos than buyers were willing to buy. Buy interest is likely waning as a result of higher interest rates and seasonality – summer is typically slow as buyers head out on vacation and enjoy the nice weather.
Here’s a deep dive into all the numbers.
Mirroring the median price, the median price per square foot declined.
In June we saw 461 new condo listings in Seattle which was a big jump from May when we saw 377 and from last June when we saw 393. This is good news for buyers, as it was the fourth busiest month for new listings in the last ten years, but bad news for sellers who face more competition.
So sellers were busy listing their homes for sale, what about buyers? Buyers were much less busy putting only 252 condos under contract in June, down from the 300 we saw in both April and May and in June of last year.
With over 460 new listings and only about 250 going under contract in June, it is no surprise that at the end of the month we ended up with more condos for sale, 478, than at the end of May when we saw 347. However, this is still well below September 2020’s peak when there were 870 condos for sale (Q4 of 2020 was a great time to be a condo buyer!)
Given the increase in inventory, I’m surprised to see that the median days on market for a condo in Seattle is still just 6 days. Surely that will increase in the second half of the year.
I’m not surprised to see the median percent of sale price to last list price continue to decline. This will likely continue to decline in the near term as sellers adjust to the new reality.
In June there were 260 condo closings, down from 304 in May. June closings are mostly from condos going pending in May.
With the inventory of condos for sale growing, and buyers’ interest waning due to higher rates, it isn’t surprising that the months of supply, a measure of how long it’d take to sell all the condos for sale, is increasing. But we’re still not in a balanced market! (A balanced market is considered to be 3 months, which we haven’t seen in ten years!)
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