buying a house on the eastside... (Sammamish, Bothell: price, budget, selling)

[Garfunkle524]

Originally Posted by cis_love

I mean will inventory rise in general? this weekend there are ZERO open house matches to my pricepoint in the area i'm looking at.

Are the OP numbers your real pricepoint?

When we were looking last summer, we saw a TON of houses that were very poorly "fixed up" by people who had only lived there a short time. The craftsmanship was absolutely abhorrent. This is your competition: people who want to buy it, dump 15 grand into it, and sell it at the biggest profit they can. If the house is in Redmond or Kirkland the profit is going to be pretty high.

[gingerbreadlatte]

All I see right now at $400K are really tiny 1200 or 1300 square feet fixer uppers. It's very different from when we were looking a few years back. Your strategy sounds great. The problem is finding a fixer upper in your price point at the size that you want to fix up. Ask around. There are definitely people putting up houses on the market soon. I know of at least 2 acquaintances doing that.

[cis_love]

flyingsaucermom, you're in Issaquah, right? we looked at a few places in Issaquah this weekend b/c i'm getting the feeling we may need to keep looking further and further out.

[Inkpoe]

Originally Posted by cis_love

flyingsaucermom, you're in Issaquah, right? we looked at a few places in Issaquah this weekend b/c i'm getting the feeling we may need to keep looking further and further out.

Your budget would be better for the peripheral edges of the Eastside (Renton, Bothell).

[Ira500]

The inventory will rise in general. It always goes up in the spring. But spring also brings more buyers.
But, over the enxt few years inventory has to rise. It can't stay this low. It's been insanely low for the last couple of years.
Great from a seller's standpoint. Scary and depressing from a buyer's viewpoint. But it's not like there's zero out there to buy. Just that more compromises have to be made, whether it's on price, or size, or location.

[jjinla]

We live in a high end neighborhood and every home sold ends up being sold all-cash to a visa-seeking Chinese investor.

Great for property values, but horrible for neighborhoods. They don't even live in them! The house across from me sat empty for 3 years before they figured out how to rent it out. I so wish that the Feds would exclude residential property from this program. I'd much rather have nice families live here, so I feel anyone's pain trying to buy. Even 2 years ago when we bought, there were 6 offers in the 1st weekend and it went $80k over ask. We weren't even the highest bidders, but the sellers picked us because we were a family that actually intended to live here.

[Blondebaerde]

Originally Posted by Ira500

The inventory will rise in general. It always goes up in the spring. But spring also brings more buyers.
But, over the enxt few years inventory has to rise. It can't stay this low. It's been insanely low for the last couple of years.
Great from a seller's standpoint. Scary and depressing from a buyer's viewpoint. But it's not like there's zero out there to buy. Just that more compromises have to be made, whether it's on price, or size, or location.

Well, per Zillow they sold the shack bottom of the hill where I live in NorKirk for $410K. I was close, guessed $400K. They then dynamited the eyesore posing as a house occupying the land. I'm watching what they're building, since, and using my magic crystal ball I suspect they'll ask for, and get, $700-950K for whatever it ends up as. Depending on the materials and etc; parcel isn't too big nor is it ideally located.

That, however, is nuts. $410K for the DIRT, not a very good lot but (frankly) a great location for families, between an elementary (4 blocks) and a Jr. High (ditto, other way).

I bought in the spring, after the "rebound" started not too many years ago (post Great Recession). It was a zoo. I'm gathering, from these comments and others, it's twice the zoo today.

The other shacks in NorKirk are slowly but surely sniped by the builders mentioned elsewhere in this thread, there are increasingly few left. At the kind of money mentioned above, who wouldn't sell some dump and run for the hills. Let others renovate it. Seller's market, on the Eastside...

[NomadicBear]

Buy a house at your own financial peril. I don't understand why anybody would pay what they are right now.

[Hemlock140]

I actually noticed a home in Sammamish just posted a sign this morning, and it's listed for under $400,000. I looked at the flyer because it seemed so low, and found that it's a 3/2 but only 1,100 sf. It's also on the corner of 228th (like a highway) and NE18th Pl, backing to the fire station. Now that price seems high. There have been a few others popping up lately, so perhaps the season for selling is starting early.

[cis_love]

prices are all crazy these days Hemlock. nothing would surprise me. thanks for the info on this.