YAKIMA COUNTY, Wash. – Home prices in Yakima County have been steadily increasing over the past decade, according to a recent press release from the Yakima County Assessor’s Office. The median home price in the city of Yakima itself has risen by an average of $21,000 per year.
A chart from the Yakima County Assessor highlights the average costs of homes and price per square foot from 2015 to 2024. It shows that 13 cities within the county have all experienced similar growth over the past 10 years.
Yakima County Assessor Jacob Tate commented on this trend.
“[Housing prices] doubling in ten years is something that does happen. It’s just not as common as, you know, a gradual 2 to 3% or 5% increase in home prices. But you have enough years of 5% increases happening, you end up with a doubling in about 12 years,” he said.
Real estate agent Candy Lea Stump from Keller Williams provided further insight, noting that the median sale price of a home in the Yakima area in 2024 was $355,000, up from $159,000 in 2014. Additionally, the number of listed homes has decreased by approximately 9%. Stump explained why fewer people are listing homes.
“As interest rates have changed, people decide to stay put. They decide to stay where they are. They say, all right, well, back in, for example, back in 2014, my interest rate is 4.31%. And today, you know, today my interest rate is over 7%. So they’re going to look at all right, well, where I’m at now, my payment is much less than what I can afford to buy at 7% because of the interest rate change,” she said.
The Washington Initiative 747, passed in 2001, limits property tax increases to 1% year over year. Tate explained the challenges this presents.
“If every year I’m limited to 1% growth, but property values have been increasing 5 to 6%, the rate drops. I mean, it’s simple division, how much total managing to collect, how much value to spread it across. And our tax base has been increasing for a while… which doesn’t even keep up with cost of living changes and salary increases, you might need to like step increases for your employees,” he said
Tate also mentioned that if residents believe their property has been incorrectly valued, they can visit the County Assessor’s Office to discuss it further.
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