The monthly Ballard Real Estate recap

Long time Ballard resident and local Real Estate Broker Sharon Giampietro will be sharing a post on My Ballard each month to keep readers informed about the local real estate market. Giampietro comes from a long line of realtors and has lived in Ballard for 30 years. She is currently a Broker at Windermere Real Estate in Greenwood.

Check out Giampietro’s recap of how Greater Ballard fared in March below:

In March buyers were happy to see that 194 new residential listings came on the market, a jump from the 148 that came on in February. During the month of March, 155 homes sold which put our inventory supply at about 1.25 months- less supply than February and a very low supply overall.   A normal market, where neither buyers nor sellers have a big advantage, is considered to be an inventory of about 4-6 months.  In March, the average length of time on the market was 3.5 weeks, up a bit from 3 weeks in February and prices were down from an average of $531,000 in February to $525,000. This is a dip in average sales price and a slight uptick in the time on market. There could be many reasons for this including the price of the stock available -a broad look at this trend over the next few months will tell us more.  The bold headline story in real estate in our area continues to be the lack of inventory and accompanying demand for housing.  This reality continues to drive sales, prices, and number of offers.

The condo supply took a leap in March with 59 new condos coming on the market, a sizable jump from February’s 35 and a few more that the 51 that came on in March of 2013.  The average condo price has been coming down – from $347,000 in January, to $315,000 in February and $286,000 in March. The average length of time on the market rose from 33 days to 39 days. More supply of lower priced condos could be affecting their average sale price – again watching this trend over the next few months will tell us more. This is good news here is for buyers who are looking for homes they can afford.

In March, a relatively low almost 5% of “solds” (homes and condos) were short sales or bank owned, down 1% from last month.

Some of our new housing stock has a contemporary, modernist architectural  style and  Bungalows and Tudors are now neighbors with this new style of home.  The visual contrast and departure from the past tell us, “The times they are a changing“. Take a look inside at a Sunday “Open House” and you’ll see that many of these homes have open floor plans and a variety of features that include innovations, large windows and some “green” and sustainable features.

Greater Ballard is Greenwood, Green Lake, Wallingford and other close by neighborhoods identified as “705” in the NWMLS.  All residential and condo numbers are rounded to the nearest thousand and unless noted does not include new construction. Statistics not compiled or published by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service. Apartment data from Dupre + Scott  Apartment Development Report.