The median price of residential and condominium listings in San Juan County have gone up since 2014, according to a report by Northwest Multiple Listing Service. This year’s year-to-date median price is listed at $695,000, up from $639,000 in 2014. Although median price was up, overall number of listings was down.

For San Juan Island, the number of total active listings for the year-to-date was lower than in 2014, although the median price was up to $688,000 so far this year compared to last year’s median price at $620,000.

According to Merri Ann Simonson’s real estate summary, the number of transactions this year is down 6 percent compared to the same period in 2014.

“This decrease is attributed to the higher number of high-end sales that have occurred this year,”

imonson said. “Fewer transaction numbers but higher sale prices contributing to the volume.”

Simonson, a real estate broker on San Juan Island, said that the market recovery is still gradual, but the two brackets of home sales that are showing the most recovery are sales under $400,000 or over $1,000,000, and predicted that by next year buyers would be unable to find homes under $300,000 that qualify for bank financing.

“Currently it is very difficult to find a nice home under $275,000. This has a detrimental effect on our community’s affordability and a direct impact on our first time home buyers,” Simonson said in the report.

The MLS report combines Orcas Island, Shaw Island and Obstruction Pass in residential and condominium listings which has a similar story, with an uptick in median price from $775,000 in 2014 to $795,000 in 2015. Despite the increase in 2015 median price, 2014 actually had 34 more new listings.

September 2015 was a buyer’s market for Orcas Island. According to Mariah Buck, managing broker of Windermere Real Estate Orcas Island Inc., the buyer’s market is transitioning to a seller’s market as available listings shrink. The average cumulative days for listings on the market in 2014 was 255, while the average for 2015 was just 155.

“The median sales price is also going up because we are finally seeing higher priced homes selling,” Buck said. “For example in the past week, we have had three homes priced over one million go pending.”

Lopez Island, combined with listings on Frost Islands, had 11 more listings in 2015 than in 2014, but median price dipped down from $625,000 in 2014 to $595,000 in 2015.