Project Wrapup

Just out of curiosity (bad character trait, that) I decided to take a look at the median prices for brokered sales in the Kenmore (North) and Summit Lake markets, then compare those figures with the data drawn from the foreclosure/REO sales studied and the public records data available in the MLS from Realist.com.

Several things need to be kept in mind. The public record data in Realist.com has some quirks. Not all sales are to be found there, since the search was done by using the 510 Land Use Code on the Auditor's Card, and that information is not entirely accurate. It is not unusual to find single family homes mis-filed under LUCs 520 and 530, and to also find 2- and 3-family homes showing up under LUC 510. This is one of those little caveats to keep in the back of the noodle when thinking about Automated Valuation Models (AVMs) that have become favorite tools of the banks and which are used by the mass appraisal folks (gummint fellers, fer the most part). I will say it once more : I think a lot of the statistics blown our way by the government are economically incorrect even though they may be politically correct.

Also, the public records data in Realist.com, as reported for the end of a calendar year, will only show the final transfer of a parcel. If it was foreclosed and sold at Sheriff Sale, then sold by the bank as an REO, and then "flipped" by the REO buyer, all in the same year, only the last sale will show. This has a tendency to skew the statistics in Realist.com upward. Theoretically, it should all even out in the end, but it never seems to work that way.

Finally, the MLS sales include only brokered transactions by MLS members -- Realtors. Sales brokered by members of the Realtist organization do not show up there unless the Realtist broker is also a Realtor (most are).

OK. Here comes the data table.

	Appraisal: Auditor	Appraisal: Sheriff	Realist.com SP	REO SP	MLS Non-REO SP
Kenmore (N) Mean	$65,031.78	$67,931.51	$64,581.00	$29,929.19	$71,789.00
Kenmore (N) Median	$61,860.00	$69,000.00	$66,454.00	$30,000.00	$71,000.00
Summit Lake Mean	$39,802.00	$44,700.00	$46,074.00	$11,218.03	$21,125.00
Summit Lake Median	$38,720.00	$48,000.00	$43,553.00	$7,587.50	$22,750.00

Cute, isn't it? I see some very interesting correlations that could lead to some questions. However, I'm not going to beat this horse any more. The entire spreadsheet is available for download from my website, www.hrubikappraisal.com/, as
February 2008 Blog Project Data
Excel Spreadsheet, 60kB.