The difference is you are using a model and I am basing my stats on real street level market information. My house was never worth $1m and the 950K would have required a lucky sale at the absolute peak. My neighborhood is very representative of the overall market and if anything has been stronger in the decline.
The problem with using stats looking down from cyberspace is that you use examples like Circuola Sequoia and Swami’s Lane which were new purchases. Both required landscaping, window treatments and assorted other improvements to make them liveable which could (and did) easily add 10% to the purchase price you used. The Swami’s house was in a new tract close to the beach which had over 1000 people trying to buy about 30 homes. More than half of them went to friends and family of the builder. If they were sold on the open market the prices would have been much higher. I was on the list to buy one myself. These are examples of the kind of noise present in the data.
I think what you tried to do is great. It was a valiant effort but you are trying to do something which quite simply cant be done with any degree of accuracy. Sure trends emerge (prices increased from 2000 to 2005/6 and now they are falling….DUH!) but they can be observed equally with common sense. What has happened and what really is happening cant be accurately determined from cyberspace.
