NCW Real Estate Blog

And it is because the state squandered the money from the boom.  Here’s an excerpt from a post of the top 10 states with looming tax shortages on the Real Estate Bloggers:

As we have talked about previously, state governments did not have any restraint during the big money years of the housing boom. Instead of socking some of the money away for a rainy day, they created new vote buying programs and built shrines to themselves.  - Real Estate Bloggers

Read the whole post above.  Remember who did this to us this November.

Tags: General Interest by Al Lorenz
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The May Snapshot Report is out from Pacific Appraisal.  An excerpt of their comments includes:

Wenatchee Market:
Year to date, sales by volume continues at a lower pace than last year -down 26%. Sales by number is down 28%.  Number of homes on the market is at 588 indicating a [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Local by Al Lorenz
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Lawmakers will explain property taxes, answer questions 

OLYMPIA…With new property tax valuations hitting Chelan County homeowners’ mailboxes, Sen. Linda Parlette and Rep. Cary Condotta will participate in a public forum on property taxes June 24 at 6:30 p.m. in the Performing Arts Center at Chelan High School.

The meeting is organized by GoLakeChelan.com and the Lake Chelan Chamber of Commerce. Topics will include future property tax changes as well as tax and budget trends.

The issue of property taxes, say the 12^th District lawmakers, is raising ire among property owners who have seen their property taxes rise an average of 6.7 percent in 2005, 9.5 percent in 2006, and a staggering 15.8 percent in 2007, [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Local by Al Lorenz
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The May Building Insight Magazine from the Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) has, on page 4, an article about a court case where the Eastern Washington Growth Board ruled that Kittitas County’s development regulations violate the Growth Management Act because they allow rural densities of one home per three acres. 

The Seattlebased left wing environmental group, Futurewise, has taken its anti-growth agenda over the mountains into central Washington. The group filed two lawsuits against Kittitas County within the last year alleging the County’s regulations violate the Growth Management Act (GMA). [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Land Use by Al Lorenz
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From the NWMLS May sales numbers show the median home price down by 2.89% in King, 6.74% in Snohomish County and 7.57% in Pierce county as compared to May 2007.  In May, there were 2081 closed sales versus 3514 in May of 2007 which I calculate to be a 40.7% decrease in volume of sales.  Total sales in the NWMLS showed a 6.19% decrease in Median Price and a volume reduced to 5,158 from 8,590 closings in May of 2007.

Okanagon county is showing a 20.47% increase in median price but sales volume dropped from 35 closings in May 2007 to 17 in May of this year. 

What is the good news in all of that?  There are [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Marketing, Northwest by Al Lorenz
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Or, did you know experienced real estate agents spend more on advertising than new agents?  This article in Bloomberg has all that and even more interesting information.  It has a great chart showing List Price Amount and Amount Spent on advertising per listing, below:

One other great bit of information in the article is most agents spend a great amount of money on newspaper advertising, while they believe it is one of the less [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest by Al Lorenz
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According to this article in the Wall Street Journal, vacation home sales in 2007 were down 31% to 740,000 from one year earlier.  That’s more than triple the decline in the market for primary residences.  That is a big hit to the vacation home market.  We’ll just have to watch the year’s performance and see how it works out for Chelan county!

Many property owners who can’t sell their properties are renting them, causing a glut on that market as well.

However, that has created some great deals for vacationers who are seeing some great deals, better amenities and lots of extras compared to past years.  It is an interesting read on what is going on out there!

Tags: General Interest by Al Lorenz
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Russ Miller alerted us to this article in the Columbian.  In Clark County, most home owners will see a decrease in their home values of between 2 and 3 percent.  It is the first decrease since the early 80s.

In Clark County, the market is showing further declines this year with values on the Mulitple Listing service showing even larger declines so far this year.

We have seen a slowing market in the Chelan area as well.  Average, even median values, don’t necessarily reflect the market value of the same home this year versus that same home’s value the last few years.  I will be anxious to hear at the forum on Monday whether the Chelan County Assessor is seeing any retreat in values as the market softens.

The article states:

Most Clark County homeowners will see a decline in their assessed property values when 2007 statements from the Assessor’s office are mailed out next week. It is the first drop in overall assessed values [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Northwest by Al Lorenz
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Last week there were two real estate auctions in Wenatchee.  A developer auction for a 37 acre parcel May 29th with preliminary plat pending and 9 homes being auctioned by a builder to close out two projects on May 31.

So, how did they go.  I asked Paul Thomas of Northwest Auctions to give me his summary of the builder auction.  Here’s what he had to say:

Overall, the seller feels that our May 31st Builder Liquidation Auction was a success. The auction marketing campaign produced tremendous exposure and visibility for his properties and four were sold in advance of the auction using [Read more →]

Tags: General Interest, Local by Al Lorenz
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While the numbers during the first part of the year were a bit slow, it would be hard to call May anything but a pretty good month for the Chelan real estate market.  How good?  Compared to May of 2007, total residential sales dollars for the month are 123% of last years, from about $7.56 million in 2007 to $9.3 million in 2008.  The average sale price is up to $620,626 from $397,829 in 2007 for May.

My summary report is here.  The number of sales in May of 2008 were still a bit lower than last year, 15 sales compared to [Read more →]

Tags: Uncategorized by Al Lorenz
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