February 1st, 2007 · 1 Comment
As noted by Altos Research and FOREM, there’s a new kid on the AVM block — My-Currency .com (don’t forget the “-” ) . For predictive firepower, it depends on the “Wisdom of Crowds” concept popularized by James Surowiecki in his eponymous book. The idea, as thought-provoking as it is controversial, is that if you create an appropriate bidding environment, in which market participants drive collective wisdom by “buying” and “selling,” that collective wisdom is often more accurate than the insights of any one expert.
Confused? My-Currency trades in real estate futures. It lists properties for sale — at this stage only a handful — and then challenges you to predict what the final selling price of that property will be. The aggregate of these predictions is the “CrowdValue.” Once the property sale consummates, the actual selling price gets compared against the predictions, and those who were best at estimating get paid in “reputation currency.”
I gave it a test spin and entered a local Palo Alto property, 359 Creekside in Palo Alto (link will be active only until the property sells). With the market here going crazy again, it’s pretty easy to predict that the final price will be above the list price, but unfortunately last year’s rule — final price is roughly 2% per bid above the list price — is no longer as trustworthy, so it’s anybody’s guess exactly how much the property will sell for. The property I entered is listed at just under $1.2M, and my estimate is a tad above $1.35M.
So, where’s the beef?
Simple, really. Those who are consistently more accurate than others in predicting property prices become neighborhood experts and get highlighted more. For real estate agents, that’s great publicity. For civilians, it just feels good. (Regular readers may remember that this very concept was my prediction #4 on what Zillow was releasing on December 6th. Zillow may not have heeded my hint, but perhaps Karim Tahawi, My-Currency’s CEO, did?)
How’s this going to play out? Very predictably, I suspect.
- Once again, innovation in the real estate biz is consumer-focussed and is being driven by outsiders. What this means is that 95% of the market participants will be consumers, not real estate professionals. Those professionals who do participate, who most likely have seen the home and have a sense of its “unZillowables,” will likely have an edge.
- There will be insider trading — almost a given in a market in which there is so much information asymmetry. Only local real estate professionals, and the civilians they were representing, for instance, know how many bids there were on the property I entered.
- Zillow will resist the temptation to add a similar feature to its site. Already stung by industry criticism that its Zestimate is just a game, Zillow won’t want to increase the criticism by adding another feature that will look, at least as first, frivolous.
- My-Currency will get sued within 3 months. Part of the financing for any savvy real-estate oriented service is a legal contingency fund, and I hope Karim doesn’t have to dig too far in to defend his otherwise brilliant idea. For what could he possibly be sued? Hey, come on, this is the real estate biz — it doesn’t have to be something substantive or real. Though temporarily pretending to play nice — due to the ever-entertaining DOJ vs. NAR carnival — the real estate industry will borrow from the RIAA playbook, and write a nasty legal letter, probably centering around the idea that My-Currency is “advertising listings without permission.” Karim, meet Glenn, another real estate entrepreneur whose great ideas often butt heads with the reality of the real estate business.
- The next logical mashup? Karim, meet Lloyd Frink and Richard Barton. I’m sure somebody’s already working on a Zestimate-CrowdPrice combo.
Tags:
Glenn Kelman,
James Surowiecki,
Karim Tahawi,
Knowledge markets,
Lloyd Frink, My-currency.com,
Prediction markets,
Real estate,
Richard Barton,
Wisdom of Crowds
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A few weeks ago I started a prediction market at
Inklingmarkets.com to see what the general public thought would happen to median real estate prices in nearby towns during the month of September. It’s a “good news/bad news” sort of thing right now.
The bad news is…it’s a thin market. Not many people are trading yet, so the predictions could be way off.
The good news is…it’s a thin market. Not many people are trading yet, so there’s still lots of (fake Inkling!) money to be made.
Here’s what the prediction market currently says median prices will be at the end of September in these cities (keep in mind the X $10,000 scale):
And here’s what the current real market medians are, as of 9/18/06, with just under two weeks of activity remaining in this month.
Menlo Park predictions seem to be pretty much in line with market reality right now — the prediction is currently $1,242,000 and the real market is at $1,250,000. Some other cities are pretty far off still, such as San Carlos, for which the prediction is $1,180,000 but the actual market is at only $890,000. A city with what seems a pretty low prediction is Mountain View, with a current prediction of $727,000 and actual current value of $862,000.
Without giving too much away…seems like market traders might want to start buying Mountain View and selling San Carlos!If you’re interested in trading on this market, click
here; if you don’t already have an Inklingmarkets account you’ll have to create one.
Tags:
Prediction markets,
Real estate,
Real estate 2.0,
Real estate data
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Every expert has their views on where real estate prices are headed. The various realtor associations regularly issue market forecasts, each real estate professional has his or her own prediction for a particular area, and of course there are also numerous housing economists who opine regularly on the market. But what does the general public think about housing prices? Our friends at www.inklingmarkets.com have come up with an innovative way of finding out, using “prediction markets” or “knowledge markets.” The notion is that if you create a market where people can buy or sell “shares” in certain future events (such as what median home prices will be in a month), the aggregate buying and selling activities of those people will lead to a general consensus. Think of it as being sort of the real estate equivalent of fantasy football. To test out the idea, I’ve created a sample market at Inklingmarkets.com called “Bay Area Real Estate Market in Sep ‘06.” Trading volumes are still a bit thin, but the current market prediction (as of 9:45pm on 8/31/06) for Palo Alto median home sales prices in Sep ‘06 is $1,280,000. Think that number is too high or too low? Go to www.inklingmarkets.com and voice your opinion by buying or selling “shares” in Palo Alto.
Tags:
bay-area-real-estate,
For buyers,
For sellers,
Knowledge markets,
Palo Alto,
palo-alto-real-estate,
Prediction markets,
Real estate,
Real estate data,
real-estate-market,
real-estate-prices
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?RE: Any thoughts on the feds (in)activity this morning?? August 5 at 9:46 pm 
�Good news, your equity line and business line of credit rates remain the same as yesterday, as the Fed held short-term rates steady today. Why? Because despite unemployment concerns, the economy is doing fine (1.4% growth year to date-- thank you exports!), core inflation is under control at this point, gas prices have dropped over 6% recently and it's more prudent to maintain a steady helm when the economy appears relatively balanced. Eric T. Trailer, Principal
