Pending sales of single-family homes in King County surged in April

If the Seattle residential real-estate market is coming back to life — and that's still a big if, despite a relatively upbeat monthly report Tuesday — it's because of people like Lori Gifford.

She and her fiancé, Scott Brush Goodwin, bought their first house last month. It's a two-bedroom, one-bath former rental in the Arbor Heights neighborhood that the previous owner lost last year through foreclosure.

Goodwin and Gifford paid Washington Federal Savings $249,000 for it.

"I've been living in Seattle for 14 years, and I never really thought I could afford to buy a house," Gifford says. But when they started looking this spring, "it all kind of came together," she says.

The key elements: Lower prices. Lower mortgage-interest rates. And new incentives for first-time buyers.

The Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Tuesday that pending single-family home sales in King County topped 2,000 in April, the first month that level has been reached since August 2007.

Pending sales — offers that have been accepted, but haven't yet closed — were up 25 percent from March, and up nearly 15 percent from April 2008.

Sales numbers were even stronger in Snohomish County, up 28 percent year over year.

Brokers said homes at the lower end of the price spectrum accounted for a disproportionate share of the surge, as did sales to first-time buyers. "Right now it's a lot busier than it was last spring," said Desiree Loughlin, associate broker at Windermere Real Estate's West Seattle office, who represented Gifford and Goodwin.

Mike Skahen, broker with Lake & Co. in Seattle, agreed. "This is the most positive market we've had in almost two years," he said. "It's been so bad."

The median price of a house sold in King County in April was $380,000, down 15 percent from April 2008. Still, that number was higher than the median price in February or March, and some brokers said it could be a sign that prices are stabilizing as demand picks up.

But sales of higher-priced homes remained sluggish, they agreed.

The median price of a condo that sold in King County in April was $250,000, down 11 percent year over year. Pending condo sales were up 42 percent from March, but down 8 percent from last April.

Pending sales usually close a month or so after offers are accepted. But the number of closed single-family home sales in King County in April — 1,004 — represented just 60 percent of the pending sales reported in March, an unusually low share.

Skahen and Matt Deasy, general manager of Windermere's Eastside operations, said that's probably because of the large number of "short sales" — sales for less than the amount the owner owes to lenders — now in the works. They can take three to four months to close, the brokers said.

Loughlin estimates short sales and bank-owned homes account for 20 percent of all sales in West Seattle.

She met Gifford and Goodwin at a seminar she hosted in January for prospective first-time buyers. The couple had looked at houses in the fall, but couldn't find anything they liked in their price range.

When they started looking again this spring, the difference in prices was "jaw-dropping," says Goodwin, who works for a travel company.

Their new house is small — 820 square feet atop an 820-square-foot unfinished basement. But it sits on a huge lot, nearly half an acre, with a peekaboo view of Puget Sound.

The land was a big part of the property's appeal, Gifford says. There's room for a workshop, maybe a greenhouse, maybe a deck someday.

The house itself has a new roof and recently remodeled kitchen, but "it looked as if people had trashed the place," Gifford says.

To qualify for the Federal Housing Administration financing they wanted, Gifford and Goodwin had to patch some walls, install gutters and make electrical repairs. But they recouped much of that expense from the bank at closing.

And, according to county records, the price they paid is just $14,000 more than what the owner who lost the house to foreclosure paid for it — in 2002.

Gifford and Goodwin closed and moved in several weeks ago — just in time to welcome their first child. Haven Goodwin was born last Tuesday.

Eric Pryne: 206-464-2231 or epryne@seattletimes.com