By Todd Lockie, Lockie Homes
The narrative you’ve probably heard goes something like this: Washington’s new millionaire tax is driving wealthy residents out of the state. Some of that is true. But the more interesting story — and the one I’m watching closely in Snohomish and Island Counties — is about the ones who are staying.
King County homes priced at $5 million and above saw closed sales jump 66.7% year-over-year in the weeks after Governor Ferguson signed the new 9.9% income tax on households earning over $1 million. That’s not an exodus. That’s repositioning. What Sotheby’s brokers on the ground are describing is a “hedge and stay” pattern: ultra-high-net-worth buyers establishing legal residency in Nevada or Florida while remaining physically rooted in the Pacific Northwest.
These aren’t people leaving the PNW. They’re people who love living here and are restructuring their financial exposure to stay.
And when someone sells a $7 million Medina home, establishes paper residency in Henderson, and still wants to spend most of their time in the Pacific Northwest — they need somewhere to actually live. A resale home in Bellevue doesn’t answer that question. What they want is a place that was designed and built for exactly how they want to live: on Whidbey, on Camano, on a rural Snohomish parcel with mountain views. Something permanent, private, and worth coming home to.
That’s the conversation I want to be in early.
The Eastside equity unlock
The broader Eastside luxury market is telling a complementary story. Inventory has surged nearly 62% year-over-year, and months of supply have risen to 3.3 — a buyer’s market at the median. For homeowners who bought $2–5 million properties in 2021 and 2022, this means their equity isn’t disappearing, but the urgency to sell is low. They’re testing the market, watching, waiting.
The sequence, when it plays out, often leads to a custom build. The resale market doesn’t have what they want at the top end. The properties that exist don’t fit the program. And they have the equity — they just need the right reason to move, and the right builder in their sights when they do.
That window between “our house is quietly on the market” and “we’ve closed and now we need to decide what comes next” is where Lockie needs to be visible.
Why this fall matters more than usual
There’s a timing element here that I think is being underappreciated.
Washington DNR is on track to release new wildfire risk maps this summer — currently expected sometime in the July–August timeframe. When those maps publish, they trigger a 6-month countdown requiring local governments to enforce the International Wildland-Urban Interface Code for any parcel mapped as high or very high hazard. The WUI Code mandates Class 1 ignition-resistant construction: roof coverings, exterior wall assemblies, appendages, driveway standards.
Rural Snohomish County and parts of Island County will almost certainly have parcels fall into enforcement zones once mapping is finalized. Any project that enters the permitting process after local adoption will need to meet the new standard — adding meaningful cost and design complexity.
Projects that are in schematic design this fall, before local adoption, are in a fundamentally different position than projects starting in early 2027. That’s a concrete, non-pressure-tactic reason for clients with sites in mind to start the conversation now rather than waiting.
On lumber costs
One more practical note for anyone in pre-construction conversations: the Commerce Department announced in April that Canadian softwood lumber duties are on track to drop from roughly 45% to about 35% by August, pending final determination. That’s the first meaningful input-cost relief in two years for framing lumber, which drives a significant portion of custom build budgets in the PNW.
It doesn’t make construction cheap. But it does give us a more defensible anchor for mid-2026 project budgets than we’ve had since 2024 — and for clients comparing bids or trying to understand why costs have moved the way they have, it’s a specific, honest answer.
The clients who stay in Washington — the ones restructuring their tax exposure while keeping their lives rooted here — are exactly the people who commission the kind of work Lockie does. They’re not making impulsive decisions. They’re thinking carefully about where they actually want to live, and what that place should look like.
If you’re in that position, or you know you will be in the next 12–18 months, I’d rather have that conversation now. The timeline, the land, the program — none of it gets easier to work through at the last minute.
Lockie Homes designs and builds custom homes in Snohomish and Island Counties for Greater Seattle clients. Reach us at todd@lockiehomes.com.