If your buyers are like my buyers -- and I have no reason to suspect they aren't -- here's what they're buying.

This is not a revelation.  In fact, I hope it's so obvious that you're saying, "Well, duh, John."

(Not out loud, though.  You know I have sensitive feelings).

For the most part, buyers want the home in the best condition, at the right hand side of that curve.  A possible exception is fixer-upper buyers, but I'm not sure they're really an exception given that by fixer upper they usually mean "something that needs paint".

And of course, buyers want the house that's in the low end of the price range.  (If you meet any philanthropists who don't, I will gladly pay a 75% referral fee.)

To be sure, the curves should probably be a lot closer together (almost overlapping) since on average the homes in better condition are priced higher, but you get the idea.

I have never shown this picture to buyers and sellers, though I think now that I have it I'll print a copy and keep it in my car.

I have, however, told buyers to imagine overlapping curves, and that the most pressure is for that sweet spot of low priced homes in great condition, what I've labelled "The Buy Zone".  I also tell buyers that they're not competing against a few buyers for all the homes everywhere in the chart -- they're competing with buyers for the homes in the buy zone.

Nobody buys outside the buy zone -- hence the title:  Dead man's curve.  Dead man's curve is whatever's outside the buy zone.  

In a buyer's market, the buy zone is narrower.  In a seller's market, it's wider. 

The problem that buyers and sellers have is that they think the entire market is the whole chart, and in a way it is, because when we say we have inventory at 9.5 months in Sacramento County or fifteen months in Amador County, we're in effect saying how wide the buy zone is this month.  But in a way, it isn't, because a market isn't a market unless someone buys something, so really the entire market is within the buy zone.