By Japreet Dhillon
Special to the Reporter
The last several years has seen the price of houses increase.
Houses have doubled in value over the last 10 years. With Bothell and the greater Seattle area on the rise with giant tech companies and new startups emerging, it is not hard to make the leap as to why prices have gone up.
Seattle continues to be one of the most moved to city in the United States, being in the top five of most moved to cities.
According Redfin and Zillow, four-bedroom homes built eight years ago were appraised at roughly $400,000. In July 2018, those same homes were valued at $701,311.
These rising home prices are affecting the newly out of college demographic as they find it hard to stay in communities where they have lived their whole lives.
Nick Smith, a recent University of Washington Bothell graduate, has lived in Bothell his whole life and doesn’t want to leave. However, with the way the housing market is going he said “there isn’t any way in the foreseeable future that [he] could own [his] house.”
“How is any person who has just graduated college, with student debt, and not a great income [going to afford a $700,000 home?]” he asked.
Seven hundred thousand dollars is about the average house price in Bothell.
“Most students on average do not make more than $55,000 coming out of college and struggle to make more even with years of experience,” said Smith.
While the housing market may be difficult for potential buyers, current home owners in Bothell who bought their homes before the exponential growth in the housing market have seen great return on their investment. With the values of homes doubling in the last 10 years.
Current Bothell home owner Varren Singh bought his four-bedroom home in 2008 for $320,000. His home is currently appraised at $700,000 — more than double of what Singh had bought his house for.
“The boom is amazing, I never thought my investment would turn this profitable,” he said. “If I want to sell my house now, I could move into a better one and it would be easy.”
Japreet Dhillon is a journalism student at the University of Washington Bothell.
