Everybody knows the peak for real estate in Seattle was 2007–at least us locals do. While the rest of the nation plummeted in 2006, Seattleites hung onto a Christian-like faith that our market was special. Then, reality struck and todays’ averages and medians show an approximate 30% drop in values from ’07 to ’10 (excluding new construction whose sales started after ’07).
Every address in Belltown showed a depreciation within the double digits except for one. The Bellora, a boutique concrete and glass building near the waterfront, posted one sale in 2010 which was only 5% less per square foot than the average of six sales in 2007. Three other buildings were kind enough to keep an under 20% depreciation unlike the remaining 15 buildings that ranged from 20% to an astonishing 38% (which won’t be mentioned based on not wanting to piss off my next door neighbors). Those 3 under 20% are the Klee, Harbour Heights and Seattle Heights.
The Bellora has always been a personal favorite structurally. The location is down a San Franciscan hill 2 blocks from 1st Avenue and walking uphill is never something I would choose to do in either direction. But, it’s quite, a block from the water and an exceptional subject for taking architectural photos. For a short period of time, I had even experienced some depression when the Penthouse sold for $2.1M as a foreclosure in November of 2005. Previously owned by a real estate agent from California, the unit had a salt-water fish tank in the kitchen, a roof-top hot tub Heffner would be jealous of, and custom black urinal in the master bathroom.
If you’re wondering what buildings downtown do have FHA approval, we have taken a lot of the guess work out by including it within each building’s unique page listed to the right. In some cases, it was very difficult to mark a building yes or no given the limited amount of resources to truly verify each. However, each building listed on seattlesavvy.com will state what we could find through the HUD and MLS websites.