A week ago we ran out some numbers on the increasing number of home sales in Spokane County. The trend here is an increase number of sales, especially over the final six months of 2011 and continuing in January.

But average and median home sales continued to fall, compared with one year earlier. The reason, as stated by Rob Higgins of the Spokane Association of Realtors, is the large supply of distressed properties still being moved off the market.

So we will here offer a statewide view: Washington’s housing market in the final quarter of 2011 saw the highest seasonally-adjusted sales since the second quarter of 2010, according to the Runstad Center for Real Estate Studies at the University of Washington.

Sales strength reflected bargain hunting as well as the persistently large number of distressed properties being sold in lower-priced neighborhoods, said Glenn Crellin, associate director of the Runstad Center.

Statewide the seasonally adjusted sales rate during the quarter was 91,080 homes, meaning that if the relative sales rate for the quarter were continued for a year, that number of homes would be sold. The rate is 6 percent above the prior quarter and 9.6 percent higher than the closing quarter of 2010, when tax credit programs to stimulate housing demand were ending.

Just like in Spokane, statewide sales prices continued dropping. Median home prices continued to reflect the weak economy, Crellin said. The statewide median home price was $219,700, the lowest fourth-quarter price since 2003 when the median was $205,700.

That median home sale price declined 8 percent between the end of 2010 ($238,800) and the end of 2011.

Sales, median home prices and affordability data for each of Washington’s 39 counties are available at the Runstad website.

Washington State University researchers have determined a housing trend that most of us could have predicted, that home sales in July through September this year skid to their year’s lowest point, reflecting the point right after the federal tax credit for first-time buyers expired.

This came by way of WSU’s Center for Real Estate Research, which looked at home sales in the third quarter for Washington’s 37 counties. It found:

Statewide sales declined 26.5 percent from the second quarter of the year to 70,550 units. It said that’s 20.2 percent below the rate from one year ago.

Glenn Crellin, WCRER director, noted only two counties saw increased sales rates compared to the second quarter, Jefferson and Adams. Only seven had increased sales from a year ago.

The areas showing increases were primarily in rural communities.

Among the urban counties, six of the 16 counties identified as metropolitan had declines of at least 35 percent compared to the second quarter, while only four urban counties reported declines of less than 20 percent. 

Spokane did not fare well, either. It had 4750 home sales, a 34.2 percent drop from the previous quarter and 30.6 percent below the same period of 2009. Its median resale price for a home was $181,000, done 5.6 percent from 2009.

The full third quarter data set is here.