Early spring shows initial signs of market warm-up

Published on: April 3, 2025

Northwest MLS, the source for the most current, accurate market listing data in Washington state, today released its Market Snapshot for the month of March 2025.

Market Recap

March’s market activity showed some expected seasonal growth as we move into spring, but an imbalance still lingers between buyers and sellers.

30-year mortgage rates dropped from 6.76% to 6.65%, a slight enticement for buyers who are keeping a diligent eye on the market. Sellers looking to take early advantage of seasonal transitions boosted NWMLS’s active listings nearly 44% year-over-year from March 2024.

“Easing of mortgage rates into spring home buying season has helped bring some home buyers off the sidelines,” said Selma Hepp, chief economist at Cotality (formerly CoreLogic).

Still, sellers and buyers alike will have to contend with continuing rising prices impacting the market. The median price for residential homes and condominiums rose 3.2% from $630,000 in February 2025 to $649,999 in March 2025.

“Rising median house prices continue to exacerbate affordability issues,” said Steven Bourassa, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research (WCRER). “In the first quarter of the year, median sale prices increased by 9.5%, which would translate into nearly 44% if compounded over the course of a year.”

Hepp also foresees that “home buying activity [will remain] muted amid a lot of economic and policy uncertainty and fears of future job losses.”

March 2025 Key Takeaways

Active and New Listings

• There was a 43.7% increase year-over-year in the total number of properties listed for sale in the NWMLS service area. There were 11,640 active listings on the market at the end of March 2025, with 21 out of 26 counties seeing a double-digit increase compared to March 2024. When compared to the previous month, active inventory increased by 1,192 listings (+11.4%), up from 10,448 in February 2025.
• The six counties with the highest increases in active inventory were Snohomish (+83.1%), Whatcom (+63.1%), King (+59.8%), Cowlitz +(51.7%), Kittitas (+48.3%) and Grant (+43.8%).
• NWMLS brokers added 9,161 new listings in March 2025, a year-over-year increase of 14.1% compared to March 2024 (8,028). When compared to February 2025, new listings increased by 44.4%, when 6,346 listings were added.

Closed Sales

• There were 5,406 closed sales in March 2025, an increase of 4.7% year-over-year compared to 5,165 in March 2024. When compared to February 2025, the number of closed sales increased by 26.7%, up from 4,268 sales.
• The total dollar value of closed sales in March 2025 for residential homes was $3,907,557,990 and was $531,478,809 for condominiums ($4,439,036,799 in total), an increase of 7% year-over-year when compared to March 2024.

Median Sales Price

• Overall, the median price for residential homes and condominiums sold in March 2025 was $649,999, an increase of 2.6% when compared to March 2024 ($633,717).
• The three counties with the highest median sale prices were San Juan ($870,000), King ($855,000) and Snohomish ($755,000), and the three counties with the lowest median sale prices were Columbia ($220,000), Ferry ($268,725) and Grays Harbor ($335,100).

Consumer and Broker Activity

NWMLS also provided insights into consumer activities during the month of March 2025:

• Keyboxes located at listed properties were accessed 120,586 times in March 2025, a 4.3% increase from February 2025 when they were accessed 115,611 times. Keybox activity decreased by 18.8% year-over-year, with keyboxes being accessed 148,536 times in February 2024.
• The total number of property showings scheduled through NWMLS-provided software increased 25.5% from 97,256 in February 2025 to 122,099 in March 2025. This was a year-over-year decrease of 2.5% from the number of showings in March 2024 (125,193).
• In March 2025, there were 13,552 listed properties that were eligible for the Down Payment Resource (DPR) program offered by NWMLS, a 17.7% year-over-year increase from March 2024.