Home prices and active listings both up in Grant County
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 1 year, 4 months AGO
This home was listed at $369,000 in Moses Lake Wednesday. Median home prices were up 15.54% between March 2024 and March 2025.
JOEL MARTIN/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
Joel Martin has been with the Columbia Basin Herald for more than 25 years in a variety of roles and is the most-tenured employee in the building. Martin is a married father of eight and enjoys spending time with his children and his wife, Christina. He is passionate about the paper’s mission of informing the people of the Columbia Basin because he knows it is important to record the history of the communities the publication serves. | April 11, 2025 3:00 AM
MOSES LAKE — Active listings are considerably up in Washington compared to a year ago, and a Washington city showed the highest growth in homeownership in the U.S. over a 12-year period, but rising prices are still making the dream of owning a home difficult to fulfill.
According to data released last week by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service, active listings rose 44% between March 2024 and March 2025 in the 26 Washington counties that the NWMLS tracks. That increase, combined with a small decrease in interest rates between February and March, is cause for some optimism, according to Selma Hepp, chief economist at real estate data tracker Cotality.
“Easing of mortgage rates into spring home buying season has helped bring some home buyers off the sidelines,” Hepp wrote in the announcement from NWMLS.
Active listings dropped slightly in Adams County between March 2024 and March 2025, but Grant County’s listings mirrored the statewide trend at 44%. Grant County had the fifth-largest increase in the state, according to the NWMLS.
New listings were up statewide by 14.1% year-over-year, according to the NWMLS, but the increase between February and March of this year was 44%. In Grant County, new listings rose 14% year-over-year and 44% from February, while Adams County listings were up 0.83% in the last month and down 109% year-over-year.
Median home prices continued to rise between March 2024 and March 2025, according to the NWMLS data. Statewide, the average cost of a home rose 3.2% during that time. In Grant County, the median home price rose 15.54% to $375,499, while in Adams County, the increase was only 0.66%.
“Rising median house prices continue to exacerbate affordability issues,” Steven Bourassa, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research, wrote for the NWMLS. “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.”
Meanwhile, the city of Kent, a suburb south of Seattle, showed the largest growth in homeownership among U.S. cities, according to a study by the home improvement website Home Gnome. The study tracked the difference in homeownership rates – the percentage of households that own their home rather than renting – in 500 cities across the country between 2010 and 2023, according to Home Gnome. Besides Kent, two other Washington cities placed in the top 25: Everett at No. 4 and Tacoma at No. 18.
ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
Quincy National Night Out scales down
QUINCY — Quincy’s National Night Out was more compact this year, which worked out well, said QPD Sgt. Joe Westby, who’s in charge of event planning for the Quincy Police Department. “National Night Out is a big event, and the fact that we’re able to shrink it up is like a breath of fresh air,” Westby said. “If you're always doing the same thing, it's kind of nice to switch things up and see how it works.” National Night Out took place Thursday on the block of C Street next to the police station, a shift from previous years when it was held at Lauzier Park. The smaller space meant fewer emergency vehicles for children to explore, but it also meant less walking for attendees. Grant County Fire District 5 brought a fire truck, and the Grant County Sheriff’s Office had a patrol boat. Renew, the Grant County behavioral health agency, had a booth and so did Quincy Partnership for Youth. Veterans Operation Creation sang the national anthem, and the Quincy Animal Shelter brought kittens that piled over each other making friends with passersby. As before, the QPD served grilled hot dogs.
Quincy Police retirements leave big shoes to fill
QUINCY — There are some big shoes to fill at the Quincy Police Department. “We’re losing 48 years of experience between them,” Quincy Police Chief Ryan Green said at the retirement party for Capt. Jorge Trujillo and Det. Damon Powell Thursday. Trujillo, who grew up in Sunnyside, has been with QPD for 19 years, he said, coming on as a patrol officer fresh out of the military. From there he served as a field training officer, a detective and finally captain. “I consider him my left-hand man,” Green said. “He runs the operations side of the house … He knows the agency very well, and he knows the community.” Trujillo has some projects around the house to tackle now that he’s retired, he said.
Big fun on a small scale
Wheat Land Communities’ Fair opens Thursday
RITZVILLE — The Wheat Land Communities’ Fair isn’t as big or as flashy as some of the county fairs around central Washington, but the folks who keep it going like it just the way it is. “It’s somewhere you can go and get an old-time traditional feeling, and you’re comfortable letting your kids roam the grounds and experience all that it has to offer,” said Board Member Lori Williams. “It’s more of a feeling than (one) specific thing,” The fair starts Thursday in Ritzville and runs through Sunday. Starting Friday, the 56th Ritzville Rodeo will take place alongside the fair at the rodeo grounds. This year the entertainment budget was expanded, Williams said, to be able to offer more fun that’s covered by the cost of admission. For the kids, there’s face painting, balloon art, Lego crafts, races, contests and games. Children can also ride on a little train towed around the fairgrounds behind a tractor.