WHAT DOES ADRIAN BELTRE HAVE IN COMMON WITH SEATTLE REAL ESTATE?

Adrian Beltre of the Seattle Mariners has been in a slump and was given a day off by the club.

Is this how he has always been?

Of course not!

In 2001 he batted a .203 average with only 6 RBIs but in '04 he was .314 with 36 RBIs.

Such is the Seattle Real Estate Market.

The stats in the past decade have shown great performance but right now the numbers aren't looking so good.

Median home prices have dropped $50,000 over the past year to a current low of $437,500 while average days on the market have gone up from an average of 85 to the current 155 with no change in sight. However, properties available on the market has seen a tick downward from a high of about 4,300 at the end of April.

What's happening in other markets? Some are in the same shape, (Los Angeles currently has over 14,000 foreclosures!) some of turning around (San Bernadino is having a great increase in the number of property sales) , and some are defining a bottom. The key factor is secure job situations and new home buyers stepping in to take advantage of low prices and interest rates. Some of the hardest hit are showing the fastest recovery from a bottom.

That obviously has not been happening yet in Seattle.

Seattle currently shows over 4,300 houses on the market and there are about 1,200 foreclosures currently on the rolls.

Real estate agents, lenders, financial institutions and local governments in many communities have seen the trend to foreclosures and short sales and have streamlined the process out of necessity. This in turn has spurred multiple offers and overbidding on the low prices properties.

Beltre can and will turn around his streak, and it is up the the job market and local industry to set up to the plate to turn around the real estate market as is happening in so many other communities.