Rainier Valley Rambler

Many buyers choose to live in one-story ramblers for mobility issues. They make great starter homes, as the resale value is usually solid; and they are great for older buyers looking to downsize.

Three-bedrooms and two-bath houses are typically the ones in greatest demand in any neighborhood. Let's take a look at three-bedroom, two-bath ramblers in the 98118 zip code of Rainier Valley.

Currently, there are six ramblers on the market right now in the 98118 area. Three of these are definitely fixers, and a fourth one is being sold as a tear-down for development on an L3-zoned lot. The three that are fixers are listed for an average price of $234,000.

The two other ramblers on this market right now are priced at $330,000 and $389,000.

Ten ramblers in 98118 have actually sold in the last six months, ranging in price from $225,000 to $560,000. The most expensive rambler and two others had extensive lake and city views, so we will drop those from our analysis here. The remaining seven ramblers sold for a median price of $350,000 ($188.17/sf) in 101 days on market.

The three ramblers with views sold for a median price of $408,000 in 47 days.

Two of the sold ramblers were built in 2013, and sold for $350,000 each. All of the other sales were for older ramblers, but all of them were in relatively good, move-in ready condition.

So expect to pay in the low $200,000s for a 3BR/2BA rambler in Rainier Valley, and around $350,000 for a rambler in move-in ready condition. Ramblers with views will sell for over $400,000.

For a complete list of 3BR/2BA ramblers for sale in Rainier Valley, or to find out what your 98118 house is worth, please message me privately at HomeLandInvestment@gmail.com.

Happy Investing!

98118

According to Wikipedia, the Rainier Valley neighborhood in Seattle, is located east of Beacon Hill; west of Mount Baker, Seward Park, and Leschi; south of the Central District and First Hill; and north of the city line. 98118 is said to be the most culturally and economically diverse zipcode in the Pacific Northwest, if not the United States.

The Rainier Valley zip code is 98118, which also includes Seward Park to the east. Rainier Valley's racial breakdown is as follows: 26.9% Caucasian, 26% African American, 34.1% Asian, 1% Native American, 1.6% Pacific Islander, 6.5% Mixed Race, and 3.4% from other races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 7.2% of the population. 11.1% of families and 13.9% of the population were below the poverty line.

The Valley is centered on Rainier Avenue S. and Martin Luther King Jr. Way S., its main (northwest- and southeast-bound) thoroughfares. Both Rainier Avenue and the Valley were named after Mount Rainier, towards which they are oriented. Rainier Avenue goes through several distinct phases, with the north-end being mainly commercial, the central (Columbia City) portion a densely populated historic district, and the southern portion a less dense collection of businesses, apartments, and houses. Rainier Beach, at the southern end, is where Van Gogh Development Corporation proposes to locate the Van Gogh Studio Lofts project.

The construction of the Holly Park and Rainier Vista housing projects to house war workers during World War II were seminal events. Following the war and until the Boeing crash of 1971, the Valley boomed with middle-class residential construction. Interracial couples in the 1950s found the Valley more accepting than the northern half of the city because of the relative lack of "deed covenants" found in the South End (these covenants were ruled unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court in the 1960s).

Ironically, the Civil Rights Act precipitated a "white flight" from the Valley despite its historic diversity. The general exodus of whites from the Valley, Beacon Hill, and Seward Park, which began in the mid-60s, was primarily over by the mid-80s, when some historic "children of the Valley" began to return to it, as well as other non-immigrant adventurous sorts attracted to its affordable housing, its excellent access to parks, downtown, and the entire metropolitan area. With the end of the Vietnam War in 1975, a wave of Vietnamese immigrants opened businesses along abandoned areas of Martin Luther King Jr. Way South, extending four miles south of the official Little Saigon neighborhood on South Jackson Street. Perhaps more numerous than this Vietnamese wave was that of Filipinos throughout the Valley, though their businesses are fewer.

Many residents cite ethnic diversity, parks and transportation options as some of the main reasons they remain in or move to the Valley.Gentrification, including rising land prices and the new light rail line, may put a damper on diversity in the future, but this remains to be seen.

Beginning in the 1960s, Rainier Valley began to be viewed as "unsafe," with this view peaking in the 1980s. As noted, the Valley is diverse and did include two subsidized housing projects, Rainier Vista and Holly Park, that have been completely remodeled as mixed income neighborhoods.

The Valley neighborhoods bordering Rainier Avenue rival any other part of Seattle for age, since they are near the historic streetcar (removed in 1937) that connected downtown Seattle first to Columbia City and then to Renton. In 1892 rails were laid to Columbia City and later to Renton. The railroad, the reorientation of the Duwamish River and the lowering of Lake Washington, which caused the lake to drain west through Lake Union and the Ship Canal rather than south, made the valley dry enough to allow building, where it boomed along with the rest of Seattle on and after the Alaskan Gold rush right up to the Depression of the 1930s.

Today, opportunities abound for investors lured by financial incentives for development in this quadrant of the City. The Rainier Valley Cultural Development Fund is a major player in revitalization efforts, and the City of Seattle offers other financial incentives such as the Multifamily Tax Exemption program, New Market Tax Credits, and transit-oriented development zoning along the Light Rail corridor to encourage development.

Happy investing!

South Seattle Real Estate Market

Rainier Beach Neighborhood Overview

I have been blogging about our Van Gogh Development Corporation artist live/work project all week. This project is located at 4354 S. Henderson Street in the Rainier Beach neighborhood of south Seattle.

The subject property is located in the Rainier Valley market area as described in the Apartment Vacancy Report by Dupre+Scott. This area is generally defined by I-90 on the north, Rainier Ave., MLK Way, and Beacon Ave. S. on the west, S. 112th St. on the south, and Lake Washington to the east.

The neighborhood extends approximately six miles southeast of downtown Seattle to Renton. Rainier Valley is situated east of Beacon Hill and refers to the entire length of the valley including the sub communities of Columbia City, Rainier Beach, Mt. Baker, Dunlap, and Holly Park.

With the coming of World War II, housing was in short supply and the U.S. Government created thousands of low-cost temporary housing units at Rainier Vista and Holly Park to accommodate the tens of thousands of war workers coming to Seattle to work at Boeing or in the shipyards.

Since then, the area has weathered a number of economic cycles since its founding. Over the past several decades, the general market area has been economically depressed, stigmatized as a low income, blighted area.

This reputation is now being shed and the area has attracted a number of housing projects. Substantial internal pressure from the community stymied the infusion of low-income housing to this area, and more recent development has been more market driven. In the last ten years, the expanding economy and demand for urban housing has fueled renewed interest in the area.

The excellent location and proximity to major employment centers in downtown and the South Seattle industrial district have begun attracting residents in search of affordable housing in the South Seattle vicinity.

Sound Transit’s light rail line (LINK) runs through the center of this market area with the Rainier Beach Station just 1/2 block west of the subject property. The 15.6 mile Central LINK Line began operation in 2009 with service north to the Seattle CBD and south to the regional SeaTac airport. In 2016, the line will be extended north of the Seattle CBD with stops at Capitol Hill and the University of Washington.

The Rainier Valley floor is framed by the slopes of Beacon Hill to the West and the hillside neighborhoods of Mount Baker as well as Lake Washington to the east. The subject is located in the southern end of this market.

Along the north end of the valley is the Cheasty Greenbelt, a system of parks. The southern portion of the Valley has Martha Washington Park, Van Asselt Playground, Othello Playground, Seward Park, and Kubota Gardens.

The valley floor consists of a wide mix of building and land uses. Asian mini-malls have been successful including King’s Plaza on MLK Way nearby. Within one mile of the subject there is one major grocery complex, a Safeway located on Rainier Ave. S. about one half mile east of the subject.

The greatest change to this neighborhood is occurring along MLK Jr. Way. Following the route of Sound Transit, new residential construction has proliferated. Examples include Othello Place, a market rate townhouse condominium development facing on MLK Jr. Way at its intersection with S. Bozeman St.

North of this project is NewHolly. The latest phase, Othello Place at NewHolly, is adjacent to Sound Transit’s Othello Station. These are examples of the housing that is being developed in this neighborhood replacing housing that was built during the first decades of the 20th century as a working class neighborhoods dominated by single-family homes.

Much of the original housing still exists away from the MLK Jr. Way frontage. These include the craftsman and bungalow homes of both the Rainier Valley neighborhood and the Beacon Hill neighborhood to the west.

Sound Transit finished constructing four transit stations in Rainier Valley. The northern most is the Mount Baker Station at the intersections of Rainier Ave. S. and MLK Jr. Way (adjacent to the subject). South of this is the Edmunds (Columbia City) Station about one mile south of the subject. South of these are the Othello Station at the intersections of Othello St. and MLK Jr. Way and the Rainier Beach Station at S. Henderson St. and MLK Jr. Way. These stops on the 4.8-mile light rail section through the Rainier Valley connect downtown Seattle and SeaTac International Airport. The Central LINK Line began operation in July 2009.

The subject’s immediate neighborhood has yet to gentrify. Most of the rental housing stock in this area was built during or before the early 1970’s. Since 1986, no new market rate units in complexes of 20 units or larger have been added to this area. However, a number of affordable housing and mixed-income projects have been completed or are proposed including three large tax credit redevelopment projects, Rainier Court, Rainier Vista and NewHolly. These redevelopments will add to the gentrification of the immediate neighborhood and the entire Rainier Valley market.

Until recently, the Rainier Valley market was largely ignored by development, partly due to the lack of high density sites and the difficulty of assembling sites in this mostly single family residential area but also due to lack of market interest in this area. Instead most new development has occurred in neighborhoods surrounding the Seattle CBD, such as the International District and the Central and First Hill neighborhoods or in Renton south of the subject site. Sound Transit and projects such as Rainier Vista and NewHolly have changed this and new interest in this market is following the Sound Transit route.

The subject’s location and desirability is expected to increase greatly over the next few years with the completion of the light rail stations, new neighborhood developments, and with the continued revitalization of areas such as the Columbia City neighborhood’s historic downtown area. As indicated by the recent and current development activity in the market, there continues to be a gentrification in the subject’s market area. The current activity in the market area is the result of inadequate urban housing and developable land supply in and around Seattle.

For more information about this project, please contact me at wendy@vangoghdev.com

Happy investing!