Chris Davies » values

10 Real Life #YEG Properties Meet the Zoopraisal™ Value Calculator

Chris — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 20:18:12 +0000

There’s been some news recently about the online advertising site Zoocasa releasing a Zillow-like online real estate value calculator for Canadian real estate. To accomplish this, Zoocasa went and bought access to Brookfield’s Centra system. They do a lot of appraisals, primarily in eastern Canada, and I’ve heard they gave Zoocasa access to 4-5 million records. That’s not a bad snapshot on first glance.

However, I’ve always said that appraisals are but one opinion of the value of a piece of real estate. Even within an appraisal they use 2-3 different ways of calculating values with differing results. I’ve also seen appraisals of the same property in the same condition differ by 10-15%.

To help cut through some of the BS, I’m going to run some recent Edmonton sales through Zoocasa and share the results. First, Addy Saeed had a good interview with Don Campbell that’s worth watching.

Don has a great quote in there. Don’t fall in love with a number. That’s always good advice for sellers. The value of your property is what a buyer and seller can agree on.

On to the data!

To do this quick test I pulled the last 10 Edmonton single family home sales from the MLS®. Because of delays in various offices enterting the data the sold dates are between October 28, 2011 and November 2, 2011 (today). Prices varied between $200,000 and $435,000. I placed no limits on the data except for being a single family home, so there’s two duplexes in the mix as well. One property (#3) didn’t have a lot size available because tax asessment data wasn’t available yet. Zoocasa wants you to:

enter the address
select from a limited number of property types
number of bedrooms
number of bathrooms
living area
lot size
year built

It’ll give area ballparks for most of those numbers and it’s reasonably close, except in new areas or where the property type isn’t usual for the area (e.g. the only bungalow on a block of 2-story homes).

Here’s a summary chart for you graphy-people. When I look at the raw data there’s some things that I think are worth noting:

On average the Zoopraisal is 2% ($8,300) higher than the sold price
6 properties zoo-priced higher than sold, 4 priced lower
In once case (#7) the Zoopraisal under-priced the property by $202,571 or 42% of the actual sold price
Of the under-appraised properties, 3 of the 4 were off by >10% (i.e. when it’s wrong it’s really wrong)
Of the over-appraised properties most were overvalued by $20-30,000

There’s no doubt it’s an interesting tool with limited data and it’s still only one tool. As a REALTOR® I’m still a little concerned that people will start focusing on a number that’s been created using faulty or limited data, making my job and the lives of buyer and seller alike much more stressful. That said, having another tool is a good thing for the future of the market.

If you want a more accurate value, give me a shout for a CMA.

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Edmonton Monthly Prices Updates

Chris — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 05:21:21 +0000

FYI, I’ve updated my massively popular spreadsheet of Edmonton Real Estate Prices since 1962 to include the June 2009 Data.

You can also check the second sheet of the raw data to view two new additions: month-vs-past-month and month-vs-month-last-year price change calculations.
Have fun and be nice to your data!

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48 Things That Matter to Tom Peters

Chris — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 11:13:58 +0000

Tom Peters is one of the world’s more visible business management gurus. If you haven’t read one of his books yet, you really should. He’s also got a list of 48 Things the Matter, available as a free PDF. I’m sharing the whole list here, but I also wanted to do a little art. Here’s a Wordle of his entire list. (Click the image to see a full-size version)

Tom Peters’ 48 Quick Tips on Being a Better Manager

“Thank you.” Minimum several times a day. Measure it.
“Thank you” to everyone even peripherally involved in some activity—especially those “deep in the hierarchy.”
Smile. Work on it.
Apologize. Even if “they” are “mostly” to blame.
Jump all over those who play the “blame game.”
Hire enthusiasm.
Low enthusiasm. No hire. Any job.
Hire optimists. Everywhere. (“Positive outlook on life,” not mindless optimism.)
Hiring: Would you like to go to lunch with him-her. 100% of jobs.
Hire for good manners.
Do not reject “trouble makers”—that is those who are uncomfortable with the status quo.
Expose all would-be hires to something unexpected-weird. Observe their reaction.
Overwhelm response to even the smallest screw-ups.
Become a student of all you will meet with. Big time.
Hang out with interesting new people. Measure it.
Lunch with folks in other functions. Measure it.
Listen. Hear. Become a serious student of listening-hearing.
Work on everyone’s listening skills. Practice.
Become a student of information extraction-interviewing.
Become a student of presentation giving. Formal. Short and spontaneous.
Incredible care in 1st line supervisor selection.
World’s best training for 1st line supervisors.
Construct small leadership opportunities for junior people within days of starting on the job.
Insane care in all promotion decisions.
Promote “people people” for all managerial jobs. Finance-logistics-R&D as much as, say, sales.
Hire-promote for demonstrated curiosity. Check their past commitment to continuous learning.
Small “d” diversity. Rich mixes for any and all teams.
Hire women. Roughly 50% women on exec team.
Exec team “looks like” customer population, actual and desired.
Focus on creating products for and selling to women.
Focus on creating products for and selling to boomers-geezers.
Work on first and last impressions.
Walls display tomorrow’s aspirations, not yesterday’s accomplishments.
Simplify systems. Constantly.
Insist that almost all material be covered by a 1-page summary. Absolutely no longer.
Practice decency.
Add “We are thoughtful in all we do” to corporate values list. Number 1 force for customer loyalty, employee satisfaction.
Make some form of employee growth (for all) a formal part of values set. Above customer satisfaction. Steal from RE/MAX: “We are a life success company.”
Flowers.
Celebrate “small wins.” Often. Perhaps a “small win of the day.”
Manage your calendar religiously: Does it accurately reflect your espoused priorities?
Use a “calendar friend” who’s not very friendly to help you with this.
Review your calendar: Work assiduously on your “To don’ts”—stuff that distracts.
Bosses, especially near the top: Formally cultivate one advisor whose role is to tell you the truth. Regularly!
Commit to Excellence.
Talk up Excellence.
Put “Excellence in all we do” in the values set.
Measure everyone on demonstrated commitment to Excellence.

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