highRground

The Denver Business Journal recently reported that many sources of statewide and local housing information provide data that sometimes conflicts. Those data sources include local public entities, such as the Colorado Division of Housing; private compilers, such as Metrolist Inc.; and national companies, such as foreclosure specialist RealtyTrac Inc. of Irvine, Calif.

With over 80% of Buyers starting their search online, consumers thirst for data, correct data. It’s not always easy to determine whether data is accurate, or if it only appears to be accurate. However, there are some things to look out for when you are looking through housing statistics.

• Consistency — Data for regularly published reports should be from the same sources and use the same guidelines, so it can be accurately compared over time.
• Representation — The more representative the data, the more revealing about a market it is. Colorado’s housing division, for example, regularly includes all sizes of apartment complexes in its quarterly apartment vacancy and rent surveys, rather than just the largest properties other reports use.
• Definition of terminology/clarification — Reports about home-sale prices, for example, should specify whether those prices are average or median.

The Colorado state housing division started compiling its own quarterly foreclosure reports in 2006, because it disputes RealtyTrac’s Colorado foreclosure data. RealtyTrac double- or triple-counts its local information because of how foreclosures are reported in this state, according to Colorado officials.

• Geography — Geographic areas such as metro Denver need to be specified. Some real estate researchers use the seven-county metro area (Adams, Arapahoe, Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas and Jefferson counties), as defined by state and local agencies. Others employ the 10 counties of the census bureau’s Denver-Aurora Metropolitan Statistical Area (the seven metro-area counties excluding Boulder County, but including Clear Creek, Elbert, Gilpin and Park counties).

More than likely, any time you see an aggregate of data, you need to verify some of the above-mentioned indicators to determine how solid the information is. More than likely, aggregate data providers are not attempting to lead people astray, rather, there are a number of moving parts and parameters that need to be taken into account to interpret the data appropriately.