{"id":117,"date":"2006-07-21T14:49:29","date_gmt":"2006-07-21T21:49:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/?p=117"},"modified":"2007-04-01T10:27:08","modified_gmt":"2007-04-01T17:27:08","slug":"if-its-a-heat-map-why-does-it-look-so-cool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/117\/if-its-a-heat-map-why-does-it-look-so-cool\/","title":{"rendered":"If it’s a heat map, why does it look so cool?"},"content":{"rendered":"

All right, here’s the deal with Zillow.com<\/a>:<\/p>\n

I decide I’m going to buy you a pair of designer jeans, nothing but the best for you. I know that fit is important, so I go to three of your best friends to get their sizes. Not yours, theirs. I strike a happy medium amidst the diversity, reckoning that — what the heck! — you can’t be that different from your friends.<\/p>\n

If the jeans I buy for you actually happen to fit, this will be a happy accident. More likely, the jeans will be a close but not perfect fit.<\/p>\n

You understand why, of course. Epistemological error was built into my sizing algorithm. I chose a method that might have been convenient, but which cannot possibly produce objectively accurate results with any degree of confidence.<\/i> Arguably, the more of your friends I measure, the smaller my margin of error. But I am still pursuing an inherently erroneous sizing methodology.<\/p>\n

For Realtors, a perusal of the tax records, the equivalent of a Zillow Zestimate, is the first step in comping, the step known to be least accurate. The next step is comping the house one-for-one with recent past sales and<\/i> currently-marketed (competitive) listings. The last step is working all those numbers against the subject property in its current state of upkeep and upgrades.<\/p>\n

In the same way, if I don’t take a tape rule to your inseam, the chances of my getting jeans that fit your unique physique are very poor.<\/p>\n

However:<\/i> In email, my friend and client Richard Nikoley<\/a> set me straight on the value of Zillow.com:<\/p>\n

I still think it can be used as a valuable tool for getting an idea of the relative values between neighborhoods in places you’ve never been to. Of course, once you determine where you want to buy, based on a number of factors and Zillow being only one input, then you need to begin the real homework.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Plus which, it’s fun to play with. It would be even more fun in Safari<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The map to the right is a Zillow heat map for Greater Phoenix<\/a>, reflecting not the ambient temperature (115!) but the (approximate!) Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

All right, here’s the deal with Zillow.com: I decide I’m going to buy you a pair of designer jeans, nothing but the best for you. I know that fit is important, so I go to three of your best friends to get their sizes. Not yours, theirs. I strike a happy medium amidst the diversity, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5,25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-117","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-disintermediation","7":"category-real-estate","8":"category-zillowcom","10":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":134,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/134\/debunking-zillowcom\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":0},"title":"Debunking Zillow.com . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"July 25, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Zillow.com got itself a ton of new venture capital yesterday, so today seems like a fine time to deconstruct its praxis. When Zillow was brand new, Catherine Reagor, the dippy local real estate reporter for the Arizona Republic wrote:Want a reality check? Go to zillow.com, a new Web site with\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Disintermediation"","block_context":{"text":"Disintermediation","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/disintermediation\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":580,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/580\/zillowcom-shade-down-creeping-disclaimerism-as-a-subject-changing-gambit\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":1},"title":"Zillow.com shake-down: Creeping disclaimerism as a subject-changing gambit . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"October 27, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Whatever. Just don't pay them off. The issue is a lot bigger than Zillow.com, and Net Exceptionalism is too important an idea to be squandered. Even if you don't know who your friends are, I will hang with you if you will hang tough... Our story so far:Welcome to Race\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1261,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/1261\/a-screen-shot-tour-of-zillowcoms-new-feature-set\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":2},"title":"A screen-shot tour of Zillow.com’s new feature set","author":"Greg Swann","date":"April 3, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Amending this: The site is live with Zillow.com founders Richard Barton and Lloyd Frink as the first Q&A links: These are screen shots I captured during a teleconference with Zillow.com Directory of Community Relations, David Gibbons. Everything is scaled to fit the weblog column, so the live pages, when they\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Marketing"","block_context":{"text":"Marketing","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/marketing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2664,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/2664\/zillowcom-announces-its-sponsorship-of-bloodhoundblog-unchained\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":3},"title":"Zillow.com announces its sponsorship of BloodhoundBlog Unchained","author":"Greg Swann","date":"February 26, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"BloodhoundBlog has grown up with Zillow.com. We're consistently second or third on a Google search for Zillow.com, and Debunking Zillow.com is one percent or more of our traffic every day. On the other hand, we've also been big boosters of the tools Zillow has built to help sellers, buyers and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1059,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/1059\/so-whats-changed-at-zillowcom\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":4},"title":"So what’s changed at Zillow.com?","author":"Greg Swann","date":"February 20, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Last look before going to bed, I saw this image at Drew Meyers' very insightful Insights weblog: I bumped it up in FireFox and got the same image. Then I hit refresh and got a normal Zillow.com home page. What had changed? I know this won't last, but I love\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":298,"url":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/298\/shadowing-zillow-filleting-redfin-and-a-just-plane-smart-approach-to-change-in-the-real-estate-business\/","url_meta":{"origin":117,"position":5},"title":"Shadowing Zillow, filleting Redfin, and a “Just Plane Smart” approach to change in the real estate business . . .","author":"Greg Swann","date":"September 7, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Dustin at Rain City Guide is giving stat-dancing lessons today. I am neither as talented nor as interested as he is, but I do have an interesting statistic to reveal: Debunking Zillow.com is averaging well over 100 unique hits a day. All of my extended Zillow rants do very well,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Blogging"","block_context":{"text":"Blogging","link":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/category\/blogging\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bloodhoundrealty.com\/BloodhoundBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}