One thing I’ve noticed about the median price is that the it’s the differences that are lagging. Basically, the reported figures are actually a YEAR ON YEAR increase or decrease in the median. For example, let’s assume you’re looking at a year on year increase of 1% in the median. Realtors and bulls would look at this and say that prices were still going up. However, it could very well be that prices were going up for the first few months, levelled off, and then started going down! Month on month prices would show you this trend in more detail, but they of course can be more volatile.
I suppose this explanation is not about the median as such, as it would apply to anything that was reported as a year on year statistic.
What’s important is the TREND of prices. The year on year figure is very nice for the history books, but is not a predictor of the future.
There are other aspects specific to the median that I know I’m ignoring – I just wanted to say my piece regarding the YOY statistics.
