Housing may be slowing down, but bidding wars are still being waged in the nation's hottest real estate markets, located in Washington, D.C., California, and Boston.
Even though the share of home purchase bids with competing offers hit a 2011 low, (the lowest since Redfin started tracking this metric), and has decreased 13 percent annually to 32 percent, coastal markets are still seeing strong buyer competition, including those that are cooling off the quickest. More than 85 percent of Redfin offers faced competition from other buyers in the top "bidding war" ZIP codes found in Oakland, Calif., Washington, D.C., and Orange County, Calif. Other ZIPs with 70 percent or more of Redfin homebuyer offers involved in a bidding war were located in Boston, San Francisco, and San Jose, Calif.
One previously red-hot market is notably absent from the list: Seattle. The only Seattle ZIP code where more than half of Redfin offers faced competition in the last three months was 98115, which encompasses the Seattle neighborhoods of Maple Leaf, Wedgwood, and View Ridge.
During the spring selling season earlier this year three out of four offers in Seattle faced competition. As of November only about one of every four offers in the Seattle area faced competition, one of the lowest rates among Redfin’s largest markets.
Advertisement
Related Stories
Market Data + Trends
Vacation and Investment Home Market Insights
A recent report finds beach homes to be the most sought-after vacation-home type and that the investment potential of a second home is an important factor in the purchasing decision
Affordability
How Much Income Do First-Time Buyers Need to Afford the Average Home?
The median-priced home is unaffordable in 44 of the 50 largest U.S. metro areas
Affordability
What Is the Relationship Between Urban vs. Suburban Development and Affordability?
A new paper from Harvard's Joint Center looks at whether expanding the supply of suburban housing could, in turn, help make dense urban areas more affordable