Ronan Lyons | Personal Website
Ronan Lyons | Personal Website

Signs of life or April Fool? The latest Daft Report

  • Sean ,

    Spoke to an AIB manager last week & they said they’d trebled their Q1 mortgage lending over Q4, thin as it was….Perhaps the faintest of pulses detected

    • Mike ,

      On the differences between MyHome.ie and Daft.ie reports – sample size is irrelevant if the sample is not representative. Are these data representative ? Highly unlikely.

      Is there any proper research into house price trends ? Relying on half baked guesses from proxy data may is a terrible state of affairs for the home buyer/seller to be in. It seems straight forward enough for an academic program or research institute to go and get some actual data direct from households: randomly poll anonymously asking how much did you pay, when did you buy ? Validate with the flip side: how much did you sell for and when.

      • Dreaded_Estate ,

        Do you think the differences between the daft index and the myhome index could in any way be due to myhome including all listings while daft including just new listings.

        Anecdotally, I have noticed a large number of price drops on existing properties in the last quarter which will not be picked up by Daft but will be picked up by myhome.

        I understand that new listings are a good indication of sellers expectations, but could a price drop be indicative of a revision of an existing sellers expectations?

        • Ronan Lyons ,

          Hi Dreaded_Estate,
          Thanks for the comment. Not all the reporting has carried the full description of the differences in sample usage. Daft uses two samples: new listings and those who revise their prices. So of the 27,600 observations in Q1 2012, 12,700 were “price changers”, not new listers (a further presumably 25,000 or so were “price non-changers”). Given that myhome also include all those properties (presumably it is the bulk of their sample), this can’t explain the difference. If anything, it should be the other way – the Daft index should respond a lot more quickly to a revision in seller expectations. Looking at the daft.ie report stats, the Q1 quarterly change for new listers was -0.7%, compared to -3.5% for price-changers – both a far cry from -7%.

          I’ve thought a good bit about the differences but can’t come up with an easy story to explain it away, given the similarity in previous quarters. One thing I do notice is that what myhome spotted in Q1 was spotted by Daft in Q4 2011. This suggests the following story:
          – Q4 2011 did actually see a dramatic fall in asking prices for new or relisted properties (as per daft), but this was hidden in myhome by the relatively small number of new listings in Q4 being drowned out by long-listed properties at higher prices.
          – The end of 2011 and start of 2012 saw a large number of long-standing properties (i.e. pre-Q4 2011) on myhome coming off the site (either sold or withdrawn). They were replaced in the myhome dataset by newly listed properties at prices similar to those from Q4 2011.
          – In such a circumstance, the large fall seen in Daft in Q4 2011 would only be seen in Q1 2012 in myhome.

          R

          • Dreaded_Estate ,

            Thanks Ronan, very reasoning on the possible reasons for the differences.

            • Wealth taxes and property taxes in Ireland: understanding the tax base | Ronan Lyons ,

              […] Browse All Posts « Signs of life or April Fool? The latest Daft Report […]

              • Property Tax is a Wealth Tax in Ireland by Ronan Lyons – Smart Taxes Network ,

                […] end of the first quarter of 2012 saw not just the usual quarterly reports – such as the Q1 2012 Daft.ie House Price Report discussed elsewhere on the blog – but also the deadline for paying the €100 Household Charge. The charge has been the focus of […]

                • Anonymous ,

                  Thanks for all your interesting information – you wrote recently in Bus Post regarding some change in falling house prices in 1st. qtr. Might this have anything to do with the large numbers retiring from public service and using lump sums to finance properties for themselves or children??? -just a thought??

                  • Mary O Hara ,

                    Hi Ronan,
                    The quarterly change in house prices Ireland map has no legend. How should I interpret it.
                    Regards
                    Mary

                    Leave a comment