Bank-owned Gig Harbor home sales business lower than nation

Bank-owned Gig Harbor home sales business lower than nation

Bank-owned and short sale homes are striking the Gig Harbor and Key Peninsula markets with less impact than much the rest of the nation.  In Gig Harbor, less than 13% of all the homes listed and slightly more than 14% of sales fall into this category.

In Key Peninsula, slightly more than 20% of the inventory fits this classification while sold homes are pushing 40% in the past 30 days.

 The Seattle/Tacoma/Bellevue area is running 17.8% of all sales but some places in the nation are running much higher-56% in Phoenix, 67% in Las Vegas and 43% in Southern California.

10.68% of the inventory but only 8% of the sales on the combined peninsulas are short sales. 4% of the inventory is bank-owned but 13% of the sales are from this group.

This table is the 30 day period, ending November 11, for Key Peninsula and Gig Harbor home sales

 Gig Harbor home sales show short sale and bank-owned homes selling in all price ranges but currently the $200-350,000 range is most active, with a few distressed properties even over $1million. Currently there is no bank-owned home listed over $1million.

The large number of pending short sales among Gig Harbor home sales is indicative of the large backlog of buyers hoping the bank will agree to their price.  They typically wait for weeks or maybe months to negotiate with the lender. In Western Washington these short sales are taking more than nine weeks for bank response-twice as long as a year ago.  This creates constant fallout of pending sales each month as buyers get tired of waiting for bank response and write an offer on another home.

 Another significant factor of Gig Harbor home sales prompted by the downturn is the large quantity of vacant homes-some new homes, some foreclosed and some where the owner has already relocated. 32% of listings in Gig Harbor and 41% in Key Peninsula fit this description.

 Carole Holmaas is an Associate Broker at Windermere Real Estate in Gig Harbor, licensed since 1967. She may be reached at 253.549.6611 or Carole@ISellGigHarbor.com. Her blog may be read at http://blog.ISellGigHarbor.com.