The Real Estate Deal

Editor Cindy Zetts dishes on real-estate and development around Puget Sound: She lived in apartments, townhomes and houses -- a dozen of them in four states -- before settling in the Seattle area in 1997. After taking a bath on the sale of her first home, in South Florida, she vowed to wise up about real estate. She bought a house in Covington 10 years ago because, well, she could afford one there.

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August 25, 2008 1:17 PM

Windermere tracks active real-estate listings weekly

Posted by Cindy Zetts

King County has fewer active real-estate listings today (16,433) than it did a week ago (16,504), according to Windermere Real Estate's weekly count. But listings are up 33 percent from a year ago.

Pierce County's active listings are down from last week and last year. Snohomish County is just the opposite -- more than last week and more than last year.

The numbers are a bit of good news -- for King and Pierce counties this week -- but not a trend in any way, despite what the accompanying note said: "Inventory continues to drop year over year."

Um, nope. "Continue" is most definitely not a word I'd use here: Going back seven weeks in King County, the number of listings were up (Aug. 18), up (Aug. 11), down (Aug. 4), up (July 28), up (July 21), up (July 14) and down (July 7).

The percentage increase has gotten smaller -- up 46 percent the first week in July, up 33 percent this week. But the actual numbers are mostly higher. Just shows how you can manipulate numbers to say whatever you want.

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