Stories on TV about the national real estate market are misleading to Americans.
This is because there is no such thing as a “national real estate market”.
Consider the latest American Housing Survey. It found that there are 124,377,000 homes in America spread across:
- 50 states, with
- More than 30,000 incorporated cities, and with
- An innumerable number of neighborhoods
And yet, the media repeatedly groups all 124 million homes into one giant lump and then gives an analysis. No matter how you slice and dice the data, a home in Oregon can’t be compared to a home in Mississippi.
This is why national real estate statistics are somewhat useless.
To get real estate analysis that matters, look local instead. And I don’t mean stats from your state — I mean stats from your neighborhood. It’s the only way to know what’s driving home prices on your street.
Unfortunately, finding local data like this isn’t easy; it’s far too narrow to be covered by the press. So, the best place to get local real estate data is from a local real estate agent or from somebody else with access to raw real estate data in and around your neighborhood.
By talking to “in the market” professionals that know your backyard, you’ll get a much clearer picture of your local market — good or bad — than the national media could ever provide.
Real estate is a local market so your real estate data should be local, too.
