Skyline Properties brokers participate in roughly 1 in 10 home sales across NWMLS-served counties, which is part of why we're starting this report: a quarterly, county-level look at what's actually happening in the Puget Sound market, without the "hot market" language that makes most market updates useless a month later. This is the first in a series that will run each quarter using the same counties and the same metrics each time, so the numbers stay comparable from one report to the next.
How This Report Works
Q3 2026 data won't be finalized by the Northwest Multiple Listing Service (NWMLS) until after this report is published, so this edition uses July 2026, the most recently completed reporting month, for every county below. Future editions will shift to full-quarter data once each quarter closes.
Median price, active inventory, pending sales, closed sales, and months of supply come directly from NWMLS's July 2026 county-level reports, published August 4, 2026. NWMLS doesn't publish price-per-square-foot or days-on-market as part of its standard public release, so those two figures come from Orchard's median, trailing-30-day housing data for each county, pulled in mid-August 2026. Where the two sources appear in the table below, they're separated so it's clear which number came from which report.
County-by-County Market Data
| County | Median Price | YoY | Active Listings | YoY | Months of Supply | Median Days on Market | Median $/Sqft |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| King | $879,500 | +0.5% | 7,836 | +23.7% | 3.88 | 9 | $531 |
| Snohomish | $719,000 | -6.0% | 2,878 | +34.7% | 3.01 | 18 | $410 |
| Pierce | $575,000 | +1.7% | 3,174 | +17.2% | 3.04 | 26 | $309 |
| Kitsap | $589,250 | +1.6% | 895 | +7.2% | 2.28 | 8 | $310 |
| Thurston | $537,500 | +0.5% | 1,163 | +27.5% | 3.11 | 17 | $293 |
Median price, active listings, and months of supply: NWMLS, July 2026. Days on market and price per square foot: Orchard, median figures for the trailing 30 days as of mid-August 2026.
Every county in this report added inventory year-over-year, ranging from Kitsap's 7.2% increase to Snohomish's 34.7% increase. Four of the five counties posted a year-over-year price increase; Snohomish is the exception, with prices down 6.0% even as its inventory grew the most of any county in the report.
What This Means If You're Buying or Selling
If You're Buying
Inventory is up in every county in this report, which means more homes to compare before writing an offer. But "more inventory" doesn't always mean the same thing. Kitsap's 2.28 months of supply and 8-day median time on market are the tightest numbers in the table. A buyer there is still moving fast on well-priced listings, even with more homes on the market than a year ago. Pierce, at the other end, has both more supply (3.04 months) and a much longer median time on market (26 days), which gives a buyer more room to negotiate before committing.
Snohomish is worth a second look if you're buying there specifically. Prices are down 6.0% year-over-year, which is the largest decline in this report, and inventory grew faster than anywhere else in the region. This points to a market where sellers are competing harder for fewer buyers than they were a year ago.
If You're Selling
Every county still has fewer than four months of supply, which puts all five below what's generally considered a balanced market. That's a different position than a seller was in during the years of sub-two-month supply, but it's still not a market where pricing mistakes go unnoticed. Pierce and Thurston, with the longest median time on market in this report (26 and 17 days), are where accurate pricing matters most. An overpriced listing in one of these counties has more competing inventory to lose ground to than it would in Kitsap or King.
Where the Market Is Diverging
Snohomish is the outlier in this data set. While King, Pierce, Kitsap, and Thurston all posted year-over-year price gains, Snohomish's median price fell 6.0%, a steeper move than the regional NWMLS-wide decline of 1.5% reported for the same month. Snohomish also had the sharpest inventory growth of any county here, up 34.7% year-over-year. Whether that's a temporary imbalance or the start of a longer trend isn't something this month's data can answer on its own; it's a county worth watching in the Q4 report.
What This Means for Brokers
The county-level spread in this data is wider than the regional headline numbers suggest, which matters for pricing conversations right now.
Kitsap's 2.28 months of supply is the tightest in the region, and its 8-day median time on market is nearly identical to King's. For a broker working a Kitsap listing, that's still a market where a well-priced home moves quickly enough that escalation clauses and other competitive-offer tactics are worth discussing with a buyer client before they tour, not after they've fallen behind on an offer.
Snohomish is the county to watch heading into Q4. A 6.0% year-over-year price decline paired with the region's largest inventory increase is a meaningful divergence from other counties in this report, and it's worth factoring into any pricing conversation with a Snohomish seller now, since comparables from a year ago are already out of date. King's numbers tell a quieter but related story: active listings are up 23.7% year-over-year, while pending sales are down 13.5% and closed sales are down 11.9%. Price has barely moved (+0.5%), but the slower pace of sales relative to the growth in inventory is worth watching if it continues into Q4.
Pierce and Thurston, both with under 3.2 months of supply but longer median market times than Kitsap or King, sit in the middle: not tight enough for aggressive pricing, but not soft enough to justify underpricing either. Tacoma, Pierce County's largest city and about 30 miles south of Seattle, is a useful example here: the combination of steady price growth (+1.7%) and a 26-day median time on market suggests a county rewarding patience over urgency for sellers. The Tacoma area page has more on local neighborhood conditions.
For a broader look at neighborhood-level conditions in the county carrying the most transaction volume in this report, the Seattle area page covers King County's submarkets in more detail. Brokers working with buyers or sellers outside their home office can find contact information for the closest Skyline office through the Skyline Properties locations page.
The Next Report
This report will run again for Q4 2026, using the same five counties and the same metrics: median price, active inventory, days on market, price per square foot, and months of supply. If Snohomish's price decline continues, or if King's slowing pending and closed sales carry into the fall, both will be worth a closer look.
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