Seattle Home Sales Hold Steady

SEATTLE (DQNews) --Seattle-area home sales held steady in September, rather than falling as they normally do from August, thanks mainly to a rise in sub-$200,000 transactions. The median sale price held firm, too, at $300,000 for the third consecutive month, a real estate information service reported.

A total of 3,794 new and resale houses and condos closed escrow during September in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metropolitan statistical area encompassing King, Snohomish and Pierce counties. September logged one more sale than the 3,793 in August, while it posted a 5.5% gain over the 3,595 sales in September 2008, according to MDA DataQuick. The San Diego firm tracks real estate trends nationally via public property records.

Total Seattle-area sales have risen on a year-over-year basis for three consecutive months. Before this July, the region had seen 37 consecutive months of annual sales declines.

Despite their strength relative to August, September sales were the second-lowest for that month - behind September 2008 and September 1996 - since 1994, when DataQuick's complete Seattle-area statistics begin.

The absence of a dip in sales from August to September was unusual. On average, sales have fallen 11% between those two months since 1994. The only other time September sales didn't fall from August was in 2004, when they eked out a 0.3% gain.

September sales also bucked the seasonal norm and rose from August in other markets nationally. The likely reasons: Short sales became more common this summer and they take longer to close, meaning some mid-summer transactions that normally would have closed in August instead closed in September. New appraisal rules that took effect in late spring likely resulted in some longer escrows, too. September sales also got a boost from improved housing affordability - thanks to home price declines and historically low mortgage rates - and buyers trying to take advantage of a soon-to-expire federal tax credit for first-time buyers.