Comparing Politics and Real Estate

While working on my statistics for my post at Realty Times, I was listening to some discussion of politics on the radio. I thought back to some of the maps that were being bandied about after the last election. Blue States, Red States were the focus of all the discussions.

But then someone pointed out that if you look by County, the equations changes- Cities favor one color and rural areas favor another, and the map proportion changed. As I pondered all the doom and gloom in the press about sub-prime mortgages, etc., I noticed that 4 of the 7 zipcodes that I service had price increases last month. What gives?

As we all know, all Real Estate is local. In fact, some of my zip codes are small enought that a builder completing a neighborhood with no further sales can significantly skew the numbers. Or, in one zip a builder finished his upscale townhomes, and is now selling mostly condos. These sales are the driving force in the statistics in this neighborhood and zip code- those less expensive condos are pushing the averages down. The state of the market depends on your level of examination.

It is important for us, as professionals, to know our numbers, know our markets, and to help people under the specifics of the market as it applies to them. Only then can people make informed decisions. We have to get it right- that is what they pay us for.