Table of Contents
Introduction: Leaving Home Our Real Estate Journey Begins 1
Stealing Home: Scoring a Data-Driven Deal on a New House
1 Warren Buffett Is (Always) Right: Why Buying a Home Is Still a Really Smart Investment 19
2 Stats and the City: Timing Is Everything When Deciding Whether to Buy or Rent 27
3 2-4-6-8, Neighborhoods That Will Appreciate: Predicting the Next Hot Spot 35
4 The Starbucks Effect: How Lattes Perk Up Home Prices 49
5 It's the Worst House for a Reason: Why You Shouldn't Buy the Worst House in the Best Neighborhood 57
6 Do Your Homework: Finding a Great School District in Your Price Range 65
7 ARMs and Legs: Fixed-Rate Mortgages Aren't for Everyone 71
8 Apples and Oranges: How to Determine Whether Buying a Foreclosure: Is a Good Deal 83
9 What to Expect When You're Inspecting: How to Pick the Right Home Inspector 93
Moving Out: The New Rules of Selling a Home
10 America's Next Top Remodel: Nor All Home-Improvement Projects Are Created Equal 99
11 Magic Words and Dangerous Descriptors: How to Write an Effective Listing 107
12 March Madness: When to List Your Home 119
14 Real Est8 4 Sale: Use Superstitions to Your Advantage 127
15 The Price Is Right: How to Determine Your Asking Price 133
16 Nine Is the Magic Number: How to Sell for More by Asking for Less 141
17 Appraising Real Estate Agents: Reviews Correlate with Performance 147
The Data-Hood: A New Look at Our Nation of Neighborhoods
18 The Gayborhood Phenomenon: Property Values as a Bellwether of Social Change 159
19 What's in a Street Name?: What Street Names Tell Us about Property Values 165
20 Empire Real Estate of Mind: Analyzing the Oddities of New York City 177
21 The Wild, Wild West: America's Most Volatile Housing Markets 187
22 Statistics Are People, Too: Looking at the Housing Bust in More than Just Dollars and Cents 197
23 What's Walkability Worth?: How Walkable Neighborhoods Affect Property Values 211
This Old Housing Market: Rethinking Real Estate in America
24 Owning Isn't for Everyone: The Case for Decoupling Homeownership and the American Dream 221
25 The Third Rail of Real Estate: Is the Mortgage Interest Deduction Really the Best Use of $100 Billion? 231
26 Down by the Seaside: How Waterfront Property Plays by Its Own Rules 239
Conclusion: Follow the Data to Find Your Way Home 249
Afterword: Health Food and Home Values: How Trader Joe's and Whole Foods Organically Boost Real Estate Prices 255
A Note on Our Methodology 265
Acknowledgments 267
About the Authors 269
Notes 271
Index 281