So far this year, 580 homes in the Seattle metro area have sold for $300,000 or more above their asking prices. That compares with 16 homes during the same period in 2020.
Meanwhile, 4,078 homes in Seattle have sold for between $100,000 and $299,999 above asking price, compared with 362 last year. Just over 6,300 Seattle homes have sold for between $25,000 and $99,999 above asking price, up from about 2,000 during the same period last year. The Seattle-area numbers in this report are based on data from the Northwest Multiple Listing Service.
The typical home in the Seattle metro has sold for $47,878 above asking price so far in 2021. That’s compared to $3,025 during the same time period in 2020.
(Note: Pandemic lockdowns slowed homebuying and selling in April and May 2020)
There were fewer homes in the Seattle metro that sold for less than $25,000 above asking price this year than last year, with 3,601 homes selling above that threshold so far in 2021 versus 4,395 last year. That’s because homes this year were so much more likely to sell for more than $25,000 over asking price.
“I’ve never seen anything like this housing market,” said Seattle-area Redfin agent Scott Petrich. “It’s fueled by employees of local tech companies like Amazon and Microsoft and companies with big offices in the area like Google and Facebook. A lot of them didn’t want to work remotely during the pandemic in small apartments, and that pushed them to seek out large homes with office spaces. Most of those people have the money to compete with other buyers and drive up prices.”
The median home-sale price in Seattle rose 26.1% year over year to a record $737,800 in May, partly because so many homes are being bid up above asking price. (Note that because pandemic lockdowns slowed homebuying and selling in May 2020, year-over-year price growth is somewhat exaggerated.)
In May, 68% of Seattle-area homes sold above their asking price, up from 37.1% a year earlier. More than 74% of Redfin offers in the Seattle metro faced a bidding war, and the typical home sold in just five days, down from nine days a year ago.
Pricey suburbs east of Seattle have been particularly hot this year. After Seattle proper, five Eastside cities top the list of areas with the biggest increases in homes sold for at least $300,000 over list price.
In the city of Seattle, 146 homes have sold for more than $300,000 over asking price so far this year, up from just eight during the same period last year, a bigger gain than any other city in the metro area.
In Bellevue, 88 homes have sold for more than $300,000 over asking price this year, versus just two last year. It’s followed by Redmond (70, up from zero), Sammamish (54, up from 1), Kirkland (46, up from 2) and Issaquah (35, up from zero). To be included in this list, cities must be located within the Seattle metro and have at least 100 home sales so far in 2021 and at least 100 home sales during the same period in 2020.
“I meet a lot of buyers dreaming of living over here because they see big homes listed at unrealistically low prices,” said Petrich, who focuses on Eastside cities including Bellevue, Sammamish and Issaquah. “But the reality is, people can’t get a home for the list price or even slightly over list price. Because buyers almost always have to pay way above the asking price to win a home, they should start their search with homes below their budget and make sure they have money in the bank to cover a low appraisal to make their offer stand out. That may mean compromising by looking at smaller homes or considering a location with a longer commute.”
The median sale price in all five of those Eastside cities topped $1 million in May.
For information on the number of homes selling above certain price thresholds in other cities within the Seattle metro, email press@redfin.com.
Note: Because pandemic lockdowns somewhat slowed homebuying and selling in May 2020, year-over-year trends for home prices, sales and new listings are somewhat exaggerated.
Redfin gathered data on the number of homes sold above certain price thresholds in a handful of other U.S. metro areas. We sorted each of the 59 most populous U.S. metros into one of three equal-sized buckets—high cost, mid cost or low cost—based on their median home-sale price in May 2021.
For high-cost metros, we report the number of homes sold for at least $100,000 above asking price so far this year, versus the same period last year. For mid-cost metros, we report the number of homes sold for at least $30,000 above asking price during those two time periods. For low-cost metros, we report the number of homes sold for at least $10,000 above asking price during those two time periods. For all three breakdowns below, we include the top 10 metros where the median home sold for most above asking price in May.
(Note: Pandemic lockdowns slowed homebuying and selling in April and May 2020)
(Note: Pandemic lockdowns slowed homebuying and selling in April and May 2020)
(Note: Pandemic lockdowns slowed homebuying and selling in April and May 2020)
