US News and World Report Shows Home Values Plunge 91.48% in some markets. The good news is that it is not Columbus Ohio home values that plunged 91.48%. The news in the article is about US retirement communities. Places that people from Columbus might be headed upon retirement.
The even “gooder” but ungrammatical news is that there is not really a US market where home values dropped 91.48%. Or at least it has been proven that Tallahassee Florida, has not seen that kind of drops in home prices. As tempting as it would be to think this is good news for those ready to retire to Florida or another market, it’s just bad math. Or lies? A post on ActiveRain (a real estate network) from Joe Manausa, a Tallahassee Florida real estate agent, titled “US News and World Report Shows Home Values Plunge 91.48%” shows you just how bad the math in the US News and World Reports article is.
Hope my title, which is quoting Manausa’s title didn’t scare you. Manausa plays with the math in his post on ActiveRain as well as his Florida real estate blog (lotsa links in Manausa’s ActiveRain post if you want to go there…. to Tallahassee real estate. )
I am not a math whiz. I can do some math. Help me. If the 2009 average price was $192,000 and the price reduced by 91.48% that would mean a savings of $175,640.60. You could buy that house for $16,358.40 in Tallahassee horse country, Florida. Right? What a deal! Wrong, the US News and World Report, Yahoo article does say the average price is $140somethingK.
Pretty similar to Central Ohio but with out snow.
Mathematically speaking Manausa goes the other way, he uses the average price now and says that means the average house in the Florida retirement community would have been priced at in 2009. The plunging prices would have fallen from an average sale price of ‘$1.75M.” Kind of the way retail works. Or does not work. Massive markdowns from prices that no one would buy at.
The US News and World Reports article, written by Emily Brandon was picked up as “10 Bargain Retirement Spots” subtitled “Retirees may now be able to afford homes in places they couldn’t only a year ago” on Yahoo. Manausa wrote:
“The article by Ms. Brandon only serves to reinforce my observation that numbers don’t lie, but people do,“
Lie? That seems harsh. Remembering a Forbes article about the worst real estate markets. It was just bad math.
Manausa goes on to say:
I would strongly recommend, regardless of your market of choice, that when deciding whether to buy or sell a home, that you find the local real estate market expert who continually provides charts, graphs, and analysis of the real estate market. “
Me too. May I direct your attention to the content on the side bar here for two Central Ohio sites? “Discover Columbus Ohio” which is in the sidebar here as ” Columbus Ohio real estate” and “Worthington Old and News” in the side bar as “Worthington Ohio real estate.” The sites are not all graphs, charts and analysis but there is a lot of graphs charts and analysis for Franklin and Delaware County communities.
Remember before you pack up your Central Ohio home and head south for bargain prices check the math.

{ 1 comment }
Thanks for the review Maureen, I think I know where Columbus home sellers should be looking for assistance!
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