Some say this is a great time to buy.

Not so fast, I say. It’s an OK time to buy if you do not have to sell first. It’s a good time to buy if you don’t have to sell first and have good credit. It’s a great time to buy if you don’t have to sell, have good credit and have saved up for this very purpose.

If you are young, have a well-paying job and would find another job in greater Seat­tle with rel­a­tive ease, this is your day to go house hunt­ing — eh, make that condo hunting.

Know what you want; then make a list.

Condo hunt­ing — that’s just what I did with a young man who fits the above pro­file. Begin­ning about a month ago, we started to look around, first online, then in the real world. Shawn had a pretty good idea of what he wanted. He made a list for me:

1. Must Have (max­i­mum 25-minute no-transfer bus ride to work),
2. Would Like (lots of light, neigh­bor­hood feel),
3. Don’t Need (ameni­ties like pool, gym) and
4. Can­not Have (pre­vi­ous owner with pet — allergic).

Do your­self and your real estate agent a favor and make your own list. In the end, we found a condo that met 3 of the 4 cri­te­ria. The seller has a dog but there are no car­pets; just hard­wood floors and a cen­tral vac­uum sys­tem. We made an offer and, after some back and forth, we arrived at a mutual agree­ment on price and conditions.

Imag­ine a day in your life.

What I tell all my buy­ing clients is to imag­ine how they spent their time. What do you do after work? Cud­dle up with a book or go bar hop­ping? Do you like to have friends over for meals or rather go to a restau­rant? What do you do on week­ends? In Shawn’s case one such lifestyle con­sid­er­a­tion was where his friends lived. Some live on the east­side some south of down­town Seat­tle. The cho­sen condo put him right in the middle.

East­side or Seattle?

We started on the east­side at the south­ern edge of Both­ell with lots of con­dos within walk­ing dis­tance to the Brick­yard Park & Ride. Shawn took the bus from work in Seat­tle to meet me there — the com­mut­ing test. We saw about half-a-dozen con­dos that late after­noon and early evening. In the fol­low­ing week I picked up Shawn with my car after work and we looked at con­dos in sev­eral Seat­tle neigh­bor­hoods — Fre­mont, Maple Leaf, Sand­point, Lake City to name a few.

If you are won­der­ing about the num­ber of con­dos cur­rently on the mar­ket, here’s the count from the North­west Mul­ti­ple List­ing Ser­vice (NWMLS).

1-bedroom con­dos between $150,000 and $200,000

• Seat­tle (city lim­its): 67
• Ken­more, Both­ell, Mount­lake Ter­race, Mill Creek: 33
• Kirk­land, Belle­vue, Red­mond: 24

2-bedroom con­dos between $200,000 and $250,000

• Seat­tle (city lim­its): 64
• Ken­more, Both­ell, Mount­lake Ter­race, Mill Creek: 48
• Kirk­land, Belle­vue, Red­mond: 42

Online real estate is like read­ing a menu; you can’t “taste the place.”

What Shawn learned from look­ing at over a dozen con­dos was that you can’t tell by the pic­tures what a place is really like. What I learned again is that pric­ing real estate is at least as much art as it is sci­ence. Too much depends on the owner’s moti­va­tion to sell. Res­i­den­tial real estate is not entirely ratio­nal. The web is full of infor­ma­tion but the smell of a place is some­thing else altogether.

What’s your take?

What’s hold­ing you back from own­ing your own place? What’s your idea of the ideal condo? What’s your pre­ferred neigh­bor­hood and why? Have ris­ing gas prices changed your mind as to where you would like to live? Your thoughts and com­ments are welcome.

Tags: credit rating, down payment, first time buyer, lifestyle preferences, Seattle condo market

This entry was posted on Monday, July 14th, 2008 at 11:48 pm and is filed under Buyers Corner, Condo Courtyard. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.