Several Snohomish County towns have quietly become some of the fastest-growing communities in the state as population centers like Seattle and Bellevue see growth slow to a crawl. State Office of Financial Management data shows Seattle grew just 0.8% last year and Bellevue only 0.2%, a sharp contrast to what’s happening farther north. It’s part of a broader pattern researchers have nicknamed the “Donut Effect,” in which remote work pulls growth away from large cities and close-in suburbs and pushes it out towards the exurbs.
Snohomish County’s Sultan, Stanwood, Lake Stevens, and Arlington are on pace to match or beat an entire decade’s worth of growth in roughly half the time.
City | Growth since 2020 | Growth over the 2010s |
Sultan | 45% | 11% |
Stanwood | 21% | 24% |
Lake Stevens | 20% | 27%  |
Arlington | 18% | 11% |
Southeast King County’s Black Diamond tells a similar story on an even bigger scale, growing 61% since 2020 after growing just 13% across the entire 2010s. Some of the growth in these exurbs comes from annexations as well as new development, but remote work stands out as the underlying trend. In Black Diamond, the share of employed residents working from home jumped from 8% before the pandemic to 25% today, according to census data, a shift that’s playing out in Snohomish County communities as more deskbound professionals trade a daily commute for an occasional one. That number likely understates the real shift, too, since the census leaves out hybrid workers entirely.
It’s not that these towns are cheap, either. Buyers are often paying a premium for a different kind of lifestyle than what’s available closer to Seattle: newer homes with yards, small-town character, and easier access to mountains and water.
This kind of rapid growth comes with friction. In Black Diamond, roads built for a fraction of today’s traffic have grown more congested, and schools have felt the strain of a wave of new residents arriving faster than infrastructure can keep up. Black Diamond Mayor John Adler says the city has adapted well overall, though he acknowledges the growing pains and says residents haven’t always agreed on the pace of change. Snohomish County’s fast-growing towns may be facing a similar road ahead, where keeping pace with population growth becomes the defining challenge of the next several years.
This post was based on information found on The Seattle Times.
