Book your Sequim Vacation Rental Now

For all those Sequim visitors, whether getting away from the big city for a short weekend vacation on the Olympic Peninsula or looking for Sequim real estate for moving to Sequim, if you still want to experience snow on Hurricane Ridge, as we did at Easter, you might want to book your Sequim Vacation for April or May NOW.

Be aware that Sequim is really busy for the Sequim Irrigation Festival 5/3 - 5/11/08. Even more desired are the dates for the 2008 Sequim Lavender Festival, taking place 7/18 - 7/20/8, when thousands of visitors come from all parts of the world to visit Sequim the Lavender Capital. It's a unique experience! You can easily combine visiting one of our two most famous Sequim festivals with hiking in the Olympic National Park, visiting Victoria and famous Butchart's Gardens, biking the Olympic Discovery Trail or just enjoying some lovely walks through Carrie Blake Park watching the wild life.

Best part of your Sequim vacation is of course the Sequim Aquatic Recreation Center SARC with an olympic lap pool, water slide, fitness center for aerobic exercise, weight room, sauna (hot air + steam). How better can you relax after a day of hiking or hunting for the Sequim real estate bargain?! Afterwards, come home to 'your home away from home' - Bell Hill View Sequim Vacation Rental - for a nice dinner. If you don't feel like cooking, pick up a great meal at Sequim Costco with a bottle of their delicious wines. And voila your evening is all set. Sit down with your honey on your love seat and relax with a movie from 120 cable channels. Stay in Sequim for a month and find out how life is in sunny Sequim.

Here is an update on Olympic National Park information 3/25/08

Heart O' The Hills campground and Sol Cuc Road will reopen this Friday.

The Olympic National Park Visitors Center is open 10am - 4pm Thur- Mo. It will reopen daily from May 1st.

The Hoh Road and campground are open. Hoh Rain Forest Visitor Center is open on winter schedule Fri-Sun.

All roads are open in the Lake Crescent area and Elwha Valley.

Deer Park Road is scheduled to open June 13.

Sol Duc Hot Spring Resort, 12 miles into Olympic National Park, opens for the season this Friday. The resort offers a 'Spring into Spring' Special Package.

Tags: Best of Sequim, Olympic National Park, Sequim vacation

Best Things to Do in Sequim - Hurricane Ridge

When we came to Sequim in September 2005 for our 12-night Sequim vacation to check out the town for moving there, we not only checked out 'Sequim Homes for Sale' but also visited Hurricane Ridge, which is on top of the best things to do in Sequim. It was quite an experience for us people from warm Hawaii.

The first snow of the season made it even more impressive. We were not the only visitors who had not expected snow so early in fall but hey these are the Olympic Mountains with Hurricane Ridge elevation of 5240ft. A lot of the tourists showed up in shorts and short sleeves. We were at least in long pants and wore anoraks, which allowed us to stay longer and enjoy the spectacular views! The below photos are all from yesterday!

Now being Sequim residents, you bet we don't only take our friends to Crescent Lake for some hiking, a visit to John Wayne Marina with a nice lunch (not cheap though) at the Marina restaurant overlooking Sequim Bay, nice walks or bike rides on the Discovery Trail and if it's berry season on a 'U-Pick Berry Tour', a visit to Hurricane Ridge is a must see on the list of things to do on Sequim vacation.

However, one thing can get in the way...it's the weather on Hurricane Ridge, which can be quite stormy. Why else the name?! That's why always make sure to call and check the 24-hr Olympic National Park Road and Weather Information Line at 360-565-3131 to make sure the weather has not shut down everything. Visit the Hurricane Ridge website for information on ski lifts, ticket prices and more.

We had planned a winter outing to Hurricane Ridge many times during this winter season but with only the weekends offering access to the mountain, it's a gamble to find the right weekend. Many times during last winter season chains were required for the mountain access road and even our snow tires would not do. Finally yesterday on Easter Saturday, when the weather forecast for the entire day had sounded really promising, we checked first time the weather for the Ridge at 8:30am. It still sounded good with temperatures on the summit at 24 F. Brrrrrr! We checked again 2 hours later. The road was all the way open to the mountain. Snow tires were still required.

11:15am we got on our way to Port Angeles, turned on Race St to Olympic National Park, showed our senior National Park pass - allows you free entrance to all National Parks for a lifetime - at the park entrance and went up the windy road to the summit, with lots of aaahhhs and ooohhhs. What vistas! The higher we came the higher the snow piled on the side of the road. We arrived on Hurricane Ridge around 12:15pm. The sun was shining. The open area at the parking area is kind of windy and makes it feel colder there but as soon as we walked - we did not rent snow shoes, walking worked fine - to the lifts, we felt very comfortable in our warm winter clothes with gloves and scarves and hats.

The ski lifts very busy with an amazing number of snow boarders versus skiers. Lots of young people seem to prefer the snow boards to skiing these days. We had a great time to watch everybody. There was even a slalom competition for kids going on, which might have been the reason that stands sold hot dogs and hamburgers. Of course, one also could warm up at the Visitors Center and buy some food at the restaurant there. We had brought our own sandwiches and some delicious tea, which we enjoyed with the great views of the Olympic Mountains.

When you come from Seattle for a weekend visit to Sequim, bring some warm clothes with you. You may be lucky for an amazing trip to Hurricane Ridge and afterwards relax at the Jacuzzi or saunas at SARC. A Sequim vacation can be quite rejuvenating! Happy Easter everybody!

Tags: Sequim, Sequim vacation, Travel, Vacation, Hurricane Ridge

Sequim Affordable Homes

We are back!
After we articulated a few personal thoughts about 2008 Sequim Real Estate, I came across a few articles in our local newspapers like the Sequim This Week and The Peninsula Daily News, which I thought should be mentioned here on our Sequim Town blog.

As Sequim has developed into this attractive retirement town for people from CA, AZ, CO or even Hawaii over the past 20 years, a lot of them financially independent and thus building or buying quality homes at the most desired Sequim locations - ocean or mountain views being a must - it seems like the regular folks are left behind. Those people who work at Wal-Mart, Costco or HomeDepot for hourly wages around $8 can definitely not buy a house in Sequim at the current prices.

City Councilman Bill Huizinga, a former real estate agent, quoted the median selling price for Sequim in 2007 at $316,750. He concluded this number from an online search of last year's house sales. The average 3 Bd home on a lot was $230,000. These high selling prices for Sequim homes affect naturally the rents people have to pay for renting a house. When we lived in Sun Meadows, we did not see one of the 2Bd homes for rent under $1000 a month. Basically, it comes down to the situation that there is hardly any affordable housing in Sequim, whether to pay or to rent.

For all the Sequim residents or those people intending to move to Sequim and work there and who are in the low income range, the new apartment buildings 'Elk Creek' off Hwy 101 might offer a solution for finding affordable housing in Sequim. The article in the Peninsula Daily News about 'Affordable Housing in Sequim' does not only list features of the apartments, requirements for being eligible but also seriously reflects an the entire issue of promoting affordable housing in Sequim and integrating those into our community. Whether Mr.Huizinga as member of Sequim's affordable housing subcommittee, will be able to 'bring home prices down to earth' in Sequim, depends probably to a great deal on Sequim developers but also Sequim residents.

Remember the value of your house gets affected by the value of houses in your neighborhood, meaning not all Sequim residents support the idea of lower-priced homes in their neighborhood. Let's hope Sequim town will find a solution accommodating the needs for affordable homes and protecting the value of Sequim homes at the same time!

Tags: Sequim Real Estate 2008, Home Prices in Sequim

Sequim Real Estate 2008 Some Thoughts

Welcome back to our Sequim Town blog,

In our recent blog post about Sequim Spring awakening, we mentioned that it's time to talk about Sequim Vacation and Sequim Real Estate Market again. With new spring life approaching, our Sequim blog gets more visitors again, mostly consisting of tourists searching for places to stay in Sequim and things to do on the Olympic Peninsula.

Won't you believe it, it's just 2 months to the 113th Sequim Irrigation Festival, which will be held May 3rd - 11th, 2008? We reported about our 2007 Sequim Irrigation Festival experience, which was great fun for everybody, spectators like us and lots of participants! But let's not get carried away. Your next Sequim vacation will be the topic of our next blog post.

Today it's time for talking business, Real Estate business in Sequim. Just kidding. Several blog visitors had asked us in the past whether we are realtors because we have several posts about Sequim Real Estate and even list two Sun Meadow homes for sale by owner FSBO on our blog. Well, reason is we try to help our friends. We are not realtors but we have the web at our fingers, with owning our own sites, like our Kohala Coast Vacation Guide and blogs, like the Sequim Town and our Best Hawaii Vacation Blog. It never hurts to have some extra exposure for a home for sale online.

When you have a close look at our Sequim town blog, you will notice that we display lots of information about Sequim, from vacation rentals & hotels, to moving & relocation resources and vacation highlights in Sequim. You won't find links to real estate companies, as there are too many to be listed and it would not be fair just to list a few and not the others.

Well, we decided to share a few thoughts about the current 2008 Sequim Real Estate market with our blog visitors. Not claiming to 100% correct or even complete with our thoughts. This is what we noticed:

Yes, Sequim has turned into a buyer's market just as so many other locations in states like CA, AZ or even HI.

Is it wise to buy now or is it better to wait even longer? Will prices for homes and land in Sequim still come more down? Well, this is a gamble, similar to the stock market. Who knows at what point the Sequim market will turn around and follow the uptrend again.

Right now it looks like developers and contractors got carried when times were good but I guess when you got once started it's not that easy to stop building. Reading the recent Olympic Peninsula Homes & Land I was more than surprised to count 23 new home developments in Sequim. 23 that is! This number does not even reflect how many building lots and sites are offered in those new home developments. Cedar Ridge alone offers 244 lots starting at $69,000 for cottage lots and asking $109,000 for estate lots. Well, considering those numbers, it looks like lot prices will have to come down.

It looks like to an outsider that not many homes get sold in Sequim these days. Our area next to Carrie Blake Park, which is much desired for retired people with walking distance to shopping and park, showed even over the winter months for sale signs and sold. Admitted, it took a much longer time to sell plus we don't know how much the seller came down in order to make the sale happen but most important it happened.

Sequim is developing and growing at a rate, residents don't know whether to welcome it or not. One thing is for certain, small town living with big town amenities + the amazing location of Sequim between mountain and ocean will keep attracting the retired folks. No question there that moving to Sequim and investing into land or house purchase seems like a good move. Make sure the price is right and you get what you wanted - sunny exposure, nice views and away from the highway! What do you think?

p.s.

Stay tuned for our next post for reasons to plan a Sequim Vacation. Don't miss our webcams - wonderful Sequim area scenery.

Sequim Real Estate Articles

Sequim Real Estate - Homes for Sale Analysis April 2007
Sequim Home for Sale in Sun Meadows
Sequim Real Estate Summer Analysis 2007
Sequim Home with a View
Sequim Home for Sale By Owner

Tags: Sequim Real Estate