Thoughts on Cottage Lake (in Woodinville)? (Seattle, Bellevue: apartments, leasing, houses)

[shaylahc]

Originally Posted by Seacove

We live in Woodinville too and love it. I would think rents would be higher than buying an older home that needs updates here. Last summer we saw a rental listed by a realtor for $3500. a month and it went within a day or so. It was a typically 80s home but it was on an acre.

We pay $3100 for our rental (and I'm sure they'll raise the rent again this year). We live in Tanglin Ridge, right up the road from the fish statue. We have postage stamp sized lots, but our house is decent sized and has 5 bedrooms (I have 4 children).

I LOVE the "feel" of Woodinville. It's small, so it feel cozy. It's not terribly congested most of the time. Library is a few miles one way, downtown (with all the shopping you could need) is a few miles the other way. Evergreen Primary Care/Urgent Care is near dowtown. Our dentist is close to downtown as well. And the schools are excellent. One of my daughters has high functioning autism and the school has just been wonderful with her. I have another daughter with dyslexia/dysgraphia, and she is thriving as well. I'd live in Woodinville for the schools alone. My kids are thriving, what more could I ask for?

We are not in a position to buy right now, but when we do, we'll be buying one of those "80s fixer uppers on an acre lot" down the road

[shaylahc]

Originally Posted by Garfunkle524

Wow that's crazy. The houses we are looking at are significantly less (monthly mortgage) to purchase and generally well-updated. Every once in a while there's a great deal under half a million in the area.

The only thing that gives me a little hesitation about the area is the fact that we are looking at older, well-established neighborhoods in Cottage Lake. We're unlikely to have young couples/young families as our neighbors which is something on our wishlist. However, Cottage Lake is close enough to all those young-family-friendly areas in Woodinville that I don't think it would be a big deal.

Unfortunately due to ludicrous housing prices here, the only place you're gonna consistently find large numbers of young families are NEW neighborhoods with no yards (parts of Woodinville, Bothell, Issaquah Highlands, Snoqualmie Ridge). It's not that we need tons of land, but we're not interested in 2000 sq ft lots where the bathroom window looks directly into the neighbor's kitchen.

The proximity to Red Hook and the wineries is a definite plus! We're pretty excited about the warehouse wineries/breweries district too, that area is just down the hill and a lot of fun.

There are tons of young families in Woodinville. I don't think you'll have any problems meeting other families. School volunteering is very popular here, and is a good way to make connections.

[Seacove]

Originally Posted by mkarch

It's interesting when you look back at the historical sales prices on those Woodinville homes - they used to be significantly more expensive than a similar size house in Seattle and now they're very affordable in comparison.

Downtown Seattle used to not be as popular 10+ years ago. The Cottage Lake area is home to the 2004 Street of Dreams and those homes sold for $1M plus then and now this home is listed right where the OP is looking 19020 NE 183rd St, Woodinville, WA 98077 | MLS# 612443 | Redfin. If anyone remembers The Street of Dreams, it used to that a high end area would be selected and land purchased to build five to seven homes and local businesses participated in the building and decoration. Then locals would pay around $15. to tour the homes for a typically summer season and then the homes were sold.

So among those $500K-$700K homes are many $1M+ homes but it's still sort of undiscovered as you don't see Cottage Lake mentioned often here.

But to your point, you're right, until Amazon started growing so fast, Seattle home costs were much less than the Eastside comparatively but in the last decade, that's changed and people are paying much more for smaller homes in Seattle. It all depends on what you're looking for.

[mkarch]

Originally Posted by Garfunkle524

Interesting. Is this because Woodinville houses haven't held their value or becuase Seattle houses have been seeing larger price increases?

Seems to be a combination of both. The Woodinville houses are selling about 10-15% below their 2007 peak values and the foreclosure rate out there is a bit higher. Some of the Seattle neighborhoods have surged in popularity in the meantime and there's far less buildable land in Seattle to meet the demand, hence prices went up faster. The other side of that is from the late 60's thought the 90's families were still largely leaving Seattle for the suburbs and that depressed in city prices for decades.

LOL at the Street of Dreams house. That was about the time they started building absolutely ridiculous homes and the show ended up dying 2 years later when some of the houses had sat unsold for years (which I guess helps qualify them as 'dream' homes!). Compare those later monsters with the relatively modest ones from the 1980's.

[shaylahc]

On a sidenote, as I was looking through recent sales (past year or two) it seems that "flipping" is popular in the older parts of Woodinville. Some investor will buy up a home that needs a lot of cosmetic updating, renovate it, then list it for $150K+ more 6 months later.

[Garfunkle524]

Originally Posted by Seacove

19020 NE 183rd St, Woodinville, WA 98077 | MLS# 612443 | Redfin

Description should read: Immaculate 7-car garage for sale! House attached.

[shaylahc]

Originally Posted by Garfunkle524

Description should read: Immaculate 7-car garage for sale! House attached.

GORGEOUS house. Ouch on the annual taxes.

Anyone have 2.2 mil to spare?

[Seacove]

The Street of Dreams had a great run until the recession. It went from 1985 to 2007. You can page through the history here Seattle Street Of Dreams - the nation's largest attended one-site luxury home and garden tour

Seattle Street Of Dreams - the nation's largest attended one-site luxury home and garden tour

There is a US Street of Dreams but they couldn't get rights to Washington or Oregon. Street of Dreams - History

[Seacove]

Originally Posted by shaylahc

On a sidenote, as I was looking through recent sales (past year or two) it seems that "flipping" is popular in the older parts of Woodinville. Some investor will buy up a home that needs a lot of cosmetic updating, renovate it, then list it for $150K+ more 6 months later.

Flipping is popular although the prices have come up to where there isn't as much room. Just changing the doors and trim on those 80s houses makes a huge difference. The brown doors and brown wood trim, along with the oak cabinets date the house. If you replace the doors and trim and either paint, reface or replace the oak kitchen cabinets, the houses look dramatically better.

The only foreclosure I've seen in that area is this one http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/18...17678073_zpid/ but it never gets listed. B of A owns it, it needs work but maybe they are waiting for the market.

[mkarch]

Originally Posted by Seacove

The Street of Dreams had a great run until the recession. It went from 1985 to 2007. You can page through the history here Seattle Street Of Dreams - the nation's largest attended one-site luxury home and garden tour

Seattle Street Of Dreams - the nation's largest attended one-site luxury home and garden tour

There is a US Street of Dreams but they couldn't get rights to Washington or Oregon. Street of Dreams - History

The page also says this:

"If you know of any quality closer-in land parcel(s) or finished building lots that would support a Street of Dreams event that focuses on a relatively smaller finished product, please contact us. We continue to actively seek these types of parcels."

There's some irony that after a 25 year run they managed to build houses that were too dream-like to sell.