Home sales still sliding in state, Puget Sound region

The number of homes sold in the state continued to slide in the second quarter, the Washington Center for Real Estate Research reported Thursday.

In a separate report Thursday from RealtyTrac, foreclosure filings for July showed the state continues to be in the middle of the pack for number of homes in some stage of foreclosure.

At 26th in the country, one foreclosure filing was reported for every 977 Washington homeowners, up 0.73 percent from June and 56 percent from July 2007.

Some 89,380 resale homes were sold in the quarter that ended June 30, 8.5 percent below first-quarter sales and 31.7 percent below the second quarter of 2007, the center said. The report does not include sales of new homes.

In King County — which had 21,340 sales in the quarter, the most in the state — sales fell 12.2 percent from the first quarter and dropped 36.4 percent from the second quarter of 2007, the report said. The median price of resale homes fell 4.3 percent from the year before to $450,000, the highest median in the state.

Snohomish County had 6,900 resales last quarter, down 17.4 percent from the first quarter and 44.4 percent from the year-earlier quarter. The median resale price fell 7.1 percent to $349,400.

The number of Pierce County resales, 10,160, fell 3.3 percent from the previous quarter and 30.9 percent from last year's second quarter, while the median resale price fell 5.3 percent to $268,500.

Across Puget Sound, Kitsap County resales fell 17.2 percent from the first quarter and 38.9 percent from the year-ago quarter. The median price of the county's 3,030 resales was $271,300, down 8.9 percent from a year earlier.

The median state sales price in the second quarter was $291,900. That was 7.8 percent below a year ago, the sharpest decline since the center, based at Washington State University, began producing the statistics in 1994.

It was the third-consecutive quarter with declines in median prices. The current median price is about the same as that two years ago, the center said.

The median means that half the homes sold for more, half for less. It is considered a more accurate picture of prices than an average, which can be skewed by houses with extremely high or low prices.

"Buyers see and hear stories about the collapse of the national housing market everywhere, and that makes them afraid to move forward with a purchase," said Glenn Crellin, center director.

Declining prices don't necessarily help many buyers, said Jan Ellingson, of Burlington, Skagit County, who is president of Washington Realtors.

"Much of the savings in prices was consumed by higher interest rates, leaving buyers frustrated that they are not benefiting from price declines as they expected," she said.

Sales declined compared with a year ago in 38 of Washington's 39 counties. But the market was stronger in the second quarter than in the first in eight counties, and unchanged in several others.

The greatest improvements were in Okanogan and Adams counties, where sales nearly doubled. The sharpest quarter-to-quarter declines were in Wahkiakum and Skamania counties, in southwest Washington, where sales dropped more than 60 percent.

Median prices ranged from $111,000 in Adams County to $570,000 in San Juan County. Among urban markets, the range was Yakima County's at $153,100 to King's at $450,000.

Home prices are not declining everywhere. Fourteen counties reported higher median prices than a year ago, the highest jump — 32.9 percent — in Columbia County in the southeastern part of the state. The biggest drop, 10.4 percent, was in Wahkiakum County.

While a sales time of five to seven months is considered a balanced market, homes are averaging 11.1 months on the market, suggesting prices will decline further, the center said.

The statewide affordability index was at 95.5 for the second quarter, meaning that a median-income family has about 95 percent of the income required to qualify for a conventional mortgage.

In King County, the affordability index was 74.3; in Snohomish, 87.7; Pierce, 105.3; and Kitsap, 106.2.

For first-time homebuyers in all four Central Puget Sound counties, homes were much less affordable, ranging from 41.4 in King County — median-income families made less than half of what they needed for a first home — to 63.9 in Kitsap.

The most affordable housing market in the state was in Benton County with an index of 171.7, while San Juan County continued to offer the least affordability with an index of 43.6.

In foreclosure news, King County had 599 properties in some stage of foreclosure — one for every 1,341 homeowners.

In Snohomish, there were 291 filings, one for every 929 homeowners.

The report contains information from The Associated Press and Seattle Times real-estate editor Cindy Zetts.