The December doldrums. The Greater Seattle housing market update, January 2025

Welcome to the latest edition of the Greater Seattle housing market, the first report for 2025! As always, you can watch the stats portion of this letter via video by clicking here. I'd recommend continuing to read below for superior information and context. 

The past few months I've been warning about what I've described as "the calm before the storm". The housing market is a sleeping giant in late Q3 and Q4. Buyers are disengaged, inventory is relatively high, and activity is overall pretty dormant. That all changes once the year turns over and the market suddenly wakes up and jumps into action. And that's exactly what I've seen, anecdotally, so far in 2025.

It happens all so fast. Within a matter of weeks we depart a market where listings were getting minimal activity, buyers were casually looking but not ready to commit, then, like a snap of the finger, we enter a market where suddenly showing activity is robust and buyers are gobbling up inventory at a feverish pace.

This is my shocked face. Consider me unimpressed. I'll cover this increasingly competitive market in the next few months of updates.

As for now, let's look back at some interesting reflections on the local 2024 housing market. It's been a wild one.

Outside of 2023, 2024 had the lowest amount of King County homes sales since 2011. In fact, outside of 2010-11, the absolute bottom of the housing market, 2023-24 were the worst years (at least as far back as my software allows me to track). It's especially interesting considering 2021 was the highest amount of home sales in this time period. To go from decade highs to lows worth of home sales, all within the span of 2 years, is absolutely nuts.

As far as national numbers go, I've heard 2024 was the most depressed market since the mid 1990's. That is really something considering how many more people we have in the country now compared to 30 years ago. Real estate has truly been in a recession for almost 3 years. The saying last year was "survive til '25". I don't know that 2025 will be much, if any, better. We shall see! 

And it's been no secret as to the reason for that. See mortgage rates below during the same timespan. 

For those of you who are homeowners, here's an exercise that might make you a little sick. Go here and see what the estimated monthly payment would be on your home if you had to buy it at today's price and interest rates. 

Did anybody else throw up in their mouth? My own mortgage payment would triple! This is precisely the obstacle for sellers in today's market, realizing just how challenging affordability is for many buyers.

Yet, despite housing affordability remaining near all time lows, Seattle area single family home values barely flinched. In fact, in 2024 home values accomplished something that's never been done. The median King County SFR sales price was $900,000 or higher in all but 2 months of the year (January and December). That includes hitting an all time high of $1,001,000 in June (the first time ever the median sale price eclipsed $1m). This is truly remarkable and speaks to the resiliency and power of our local housing market. 

BREAKING NEWS: As I'm in the middle of this report, I'm learning that META (Facebook) just announced a layoff of 5% of it's workforce. I don't see where those jobs are located (I'd assume mostly in the Bay Area), but it's possible some are in the Seattle area. More locally, Redfin also just laid off 46 employees, too. Not to be outdone, but their competitor, Zillow, also announced layoffs. If/how this impacts the local housing market will remain to be seen. I doubt these collective layoffs will make much, if any, impact, but I'm already hearing of some local buyers pausing their home search until they get more clarity in the security of their employment.

As discussed in last month's report, Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell's One Seattle Plan, aimed at increasing density by rezoning many neighborhoods in Seattle to make them conducive for multi-story and multi-family buildings, is still progressing. If you'd like to comment, and/or keep track of how this is progressing, click here. As the co-president of my neighborhood community council, we're getting LOTS of questions from neighbors. 

Onto the stats:

Seattle: 2024 ended with a December median sale price of $898,900. That is up 5.75% YoY yet down MoM from $968,000. Total inventory was up 11.9% YoY, yet the months of inventory statistic fell to 1.42 months from 1.79 months. 

Eastside: December 2024 median sale price of $1,545,000. That is up 7.29% YoY and up just slightly, MOM by $8,000. Total inventory was up 21.6% YoY and the months of inventory statistic increased slightly MoM to 1.24 months from 1.17.

King County: December 2024 median sale price of $875,000. That is up 2.95% YoY and down MoM from $925,000. Total inventory was up 21.28% YoY, but the months of inventory statistic fell to 1.28 months from 1.49. 

Thank you all again for an amazing 2024. I enjoy creating this report for you each month and hope you get even a smidge of value out of it. Best of luck in 2025.

Onward!