Home prices up, interest rates all over in 2024
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 5 months, 4 weeks AGO
This home in the Cascade Valley area of Moses Lake was listed for $499,900 Wednesday. Cascade Valley saw some of the highest increases in median home prices in Grant County in 2024.
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. | January 24, 2025 1:00 AM
KIRKLAND — Home prices and sales rose steadily in Washington in 2024 even as mortgage interest rates bounced up and down, according to data released by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service on Jan. 17. The NWMLS tracks real estate trends in 26 of Washington’s 39 counties.
The average 30-year home mortgage began the year at 6.62%, according to the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, commonly called Freddie Mac. The rate went to 7.44% in early May, dropped to 6.08% in September and finished the year at 6.85%. As of Jan. 18, 2025, the rate was 7.04%.
Those rates are comparatively recent, according to Freddie Mac’s data, stemming from a drastic jump in 2022 when the rate went from 3.45% in January to 7.08% in September. Interest rates have hovered in the 6-8% range since, frustrating buyers, sellers and real estate agents.
“In 2022 it was strictly a seller’s market,” Quincy real estate agent Tom Parrish told the Columbia Basin Herald in August. “Interest rates were still in that 4-5% (range) and they went up during this last couple of years, for a while even (to) 8% and now (have) come down to the upper sixes, sevens, in that area. That's been a big influence.”
“It’s harder for first-time home buyers because they’re seeing it as high, but if you look at the history, we’re still at a very affordable rate as opposed to 40 years ago,” Moses Lake agent Tami Canfield said in October. Rates were in double digits throughout the 1980s and dipped below the current rate for the first time in 1998, according to Freddie Mac.
Despite buyers’ hesitancy, median home prices were consistently up statewide in 2024 compared to 2023, a 12-month average increase of 6.7%. Prices in the Basin didn’t necessarily follow that trend, however: Adams County homes averaged only 2.38% higher and Grant County 2.99% higher. Home prices in the Cascade Valley and Mae Valley areas of Grant County showed the highest increase at 12.9% and 9.14% respectively, while homes in the Peninsula area of Moses Lake dropped 19.24%.
Active listings also increased statewide in 2024, coming in at 24.33% higher than 2023, according to the NWMLS. Grant County active listings rose by 30.18% overall, with the greatest increases in the rural central and western parts of the county. Active listings in Adams County dropped 4.8%.
The trend appears to be set for the foreseeable future, according to Steven Bourassa, director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research (WCRER) at the University of Washington.
“We may well be experiencing the pains of adjusting to a new normal, with persistent interest rates of 6% or higher,” Bourassa wrote in the NWMLS data.
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ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
New owners celebrate first anniversary at Basin RV
MOSES LAKE — Basin RV has been under new ownership for a year now, and the owners are getting more involved in the community, sponsoring the Brett Reese Memorial Car Show, the Sand Scorpions Bounty Hole, the Cowboy Breakfast and more. “We’ve got five kids ourselves,” said owner RJ McFadden. “They all go to school here in town. So camping in our community is kind of our thing, spreading the dollars here.”
Mulligan’s at the Pointe under new management
MOSES LAKE — Out on the very western edge Moses Lake, away from the downtown core and the shopping centers, there’s a restaurant that many local people still haven’t experienced. “This place really is a little hidden gem,” said Megan Costello, food and beverage manager for Mulligan’s. “(We have) a beautiful view, a huge outdoor seating area, a 75-inch TV for sporting events.”
Home inventory up, sales slow but still steady in the Basin
MOSES LAKE — There’s a lot of activity going on in the real estate compared to a year ago, according to data from the Northwest Multiple Listing Service, which tracks real estate trends in 26 Washington counties. According to the NWMLS, Grant and Adams counties had higher increases in active listings and closed sales in June 2025 over June 2024 than the rest of the state. But the activity on the ground only partly bears that out, said Brian Gentry, principal managing broker for Re/Max in Othello. “Over last year, yes,” Gentry said. “Over three years ago, no. There’s a lot more inventory right now. Where we would typically on any given day see in Othello 11 or 12 things on the market, we’re in about the 35 range right now. Some of those are new construction, so they’re presales, but there’s a lot of people putting their homes on the market.”