When a non-real estate professional decides to write an article loaded with real estate statistics, can that be a good thing? Particularly if those stats are accurate . . . but need some background to explain them?
An editor for our local Patch newspaper (which does occasionally publish some of my posts) wrote a article about January homes prices this year being "significantly up" from January of 2013. The numbers were so outstanding that I checked the MLS myself.
For the two towns that were discussed, sale prices increased by 54% and 22%. That's huge, don't you think? I know that 2013 was a good year, it was the first year emerging out of the recession that dragged us to the abyss. But that didn't sound right.
It turns out that the numbers are fairly accurate. However, all the percentages are based on a very low number of sales. The town that had the 54% increase in sales price had sales like this:
January 2013
January 2014
As you can see, home prices in the 2nd example are much higher - it just happened, by accident, that more homes sold over $1 million this January. And in January of 2013, 7 of the 8 homes sold for well under $1 million. It doesn't mean that the local market has exploded into double-digit inflation.
Every list of numbers has a median in it, but proclaiming that prices have "significantly" increased is inaccurate and misleading. At the very least, use a larger sampling - either the entire year, or the entire area for one month.
I think real estate articles should be written or edited by real estate professionals. The public will misinterpret the numbers and our jobs to get homes priced reasonably will be more difficult.
On two listing appointments this week, the sellers asked if I had seen that great article about house prices going up 54% . . . I believe I've got my work cut out for me.
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