Interest down, inventory up in Basin housing market
JOEL MARTIN | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 2 weeks, 5 days AGO
This house in Moses Lake was listed at $397,000 Wednesday. Median home prices increased slightly in Grant County over the last year.
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. | November 15, 2025 8:05 AM
KIRKLAND — The prospects for home buyers in Washington are looking up, according to data released last week by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service, which tracks real estate trends in 27 Washington counties.
The average 30-year fixed mortgage interest rate was 6.17% at the end of October, the lowest it’s been in more than a year, according to Freddie Mac. On Wednesday, it had risen slightly to 6.22%, still lower than any point since September 2024. At the same time, active listings are up 27% statewide between October 2024 and October 2025, according to the NWMLS data. The average months of inventory, or the amount of time it would take to sell all homes on the market, was up 32% year-over-year statewide to 3.02. Grant and Adams counties held steady at 4.8 and 8.7 months of inventory, respectively.
That combination gives buyers a little more freedom to pick and choose, Quincy Realtor Tom Parrish told the Columbia Basin Herald in October.
“If you have three to four months of inventory for people to look at, that means they've got more choices and then they're going to have the ability then to make an offer and have that offer accepted and not have to feel that they're out of the game,” Parrish said.
Active listings increased in Grant County by 23% between October 2024 and October 2025, according to the NWMLS data. Adams County’s active listings were up 17%.
The increase was most noticeable in the area of Grant County east of Moses Lake, including Wheeler, Ruff, Warden and the MarDon area, where active listings more than doubled from a year earlier.
Closed sales dropped statewide by 4% year-over-year, according to the NWMLS data, but in Grant County, the figure was up by 24.3%. Closed sales in Adams County dropped from 12 in October 2024 to 10 in October 2025.
Median home prices dropped in Adams County by 14% year-over-year to $317,740, according to the NWMLS data. Grant County’s median home price shows a slight increase, 3.7%, to $354,308. The median home price statewide was $640,000, a decrease of 1.5%.
Despite the positive moves, the long-term picture for potential home buyers isn’t necessarily rosier, Steven Bourassa, Director of the Washington Center for Real Estate Research at the University of Washington, wrote in the NWMLS release.
“The year-over-year numbers suggest that potential buyers continue to be constrained by high interest rates,” Bourassa wrote. “While it might be tempting, it would be overreaching to attribute the latest month-over-month changes to lower interest rates. One month of data does not constitute a trend, and it is very difficult to predict whether the current moderating trend will continue.”
ARTICLES BY JOEL MARTIN
Moses Lake teachers march downtown
MOSES LAKE — Teachers from across Moses Lake marched from Sinkiuse Square to Frontier Middle School Thursdayin support of the Moses Lake Education Association’s work stoppage. The teachers stayed at Frontier while a band played at Carl Ahlers Park across the street and passing motorists honked. The teachers had been on strike for four days while the union negotiates a new contract with the Moses Lake School District.
Mini-farm for sale has deep Grant County roots
SOAP LAKE — There’s a little piece of history in the mini-farm for sale east of Soap Lake. “It’s been with the same owner since the 1930s,” said Anna Van Diest of Moses Lake Realty Group, who is listing the 25.19-acre property at 20226 NE Adrian Road, just south of SR 28. The well, still in use, was dug in 1931, she added, more than two decades before the Columbia Basin Project brought irrigation water to the Basin. There’s not much left now of the town of Adrian, but if things had gone a little differently in 1910, the Grant County Courthouse might have been located where the farm now stands. When Grant County was formed out of the eastern part of Douglas County in 1909, the city of Ephrata, then just over 300 people, was named the county seat. The people of Adrian got up a petition the following year to grab the county seat away, according to the Washington history site historylink.org, but were defeated in a 945-802 vote. A few remnants of the town and the railroad cutoff nearby are still visible from the road or in aerial photos.
‘People connector’
Small business mentor Allan Peterson prepares to retire
MOSES LAKE — Allan Peterson is hanging it up after more than two decades of helping the little guy find success. “(We) really appreciate all that he has done for Grant County,” Grant County Economic Development Council Director Brant Mayo said. “He’s been an unsung hero of the growth in this area.”