Katie Curnutte's Discussions

I'm the PR manager for data here at Zillow, and I've been examining our second quarter data and looking for interesting trends. One thing I've been looking at is our median down payment information. We have this back to 2003 in the 165 markets we cover, and I've noticed a lot of variations.In quite a few markets (LA, San Francisco and a bunch of other California markets) median down payments were 20 percent in the first two quarters of 2008. That's no surprise. I know lenders and homebuyers alike are being more cautious lately, so that makes sense to me.But I've also noticed that there are a handful of markets where the median down payment has been 20 percent every year since 2003. These are mostly in New England, New York City and Florida.I've had quite a few people ask me why this is, and I'm dying to know. I'm from Boston myself, but I'm flummoxed. Is it a cultural thing? A wealth thing? Are there regulations in these places that I don't know about?Let me know what you think. I'd love to get some opinions.

We here at Zillow just conducted a survey that showed about half of U.S. homeowners think their home's value has either increased or stayed the same over the past year. According to Q3 preliminary data, that's just not true; 74% of homes have dropped in value.Do you run into this type of sentiment when advising sellers? Is it difficult to get them to set a realistic price for their home? How do you convince a stubborn seller to set the correct price?

Hi Driscoll,It's definitely not by choice that we don't have Houston-area data. We don't choose which areas to report on based only on size, but rather on the quality of data we have there. We want to make sure the reports we do issue are as accurate as possible.Texas, unfortunately, is a non-disclosure state, meaning we can't get public records regarding sales transactions. This is an important tool for us when compiling the quarterly reports. We have data for places like Austin and Dallas because we have access to MLS data there, but we don't have this ability in Houston.I'm sorry I couldn't be more help, but I hope my explanation makes sense!

Good points, both Sam and TM. TM, Zillow's Q4 Real Estate Market Reports showed that almost 20% of all transactions in '08 were foreclosures, so there's that piece of the puzzle.What are your thoughts on Home Affordable? Do you think it will help the 7-9 million homeowners the administration says it will? I wrote a couple blog posts on the nitty-gritty -- who qualifies for the Home Affordable refinance and the loan modification -- but I'm curious to see what others think.If the refi and loan mod together help 9 million, that's about 10% of all homeowners in the U.S. That would be significant.We did some of our own analysis to see how many homeowners the refi might help. We found that about 25% of homeowners with mortgages, or 14 million, fall into the limits to qualify for the Home Affordable refi (LTV 80-105%, conforming loan), but we don't have any way to see how many of these are backed by Fannie/Freddie.

Looking for some mid-priced vacation destinations where someone could either get a great deal on a second home, or where the market is holding up well. It's for a reporter. Anyone have any ideas? Thanks!

Zillow's Chief Economist Dr. Stan Humphries had an interesting take on Case-Shiller. In a blog post he wrote in April, he explained that the index might be overstating the declines in median home prices, thanks to its inclusion of foreclosures.The Zillow Home Value Index doesn't include foreclosures, however, and we showed a year-over-year decline in home valuese of 14.2 percent at the end of March.

Hi km9,Zillow has a very comprehensive page on local housing trends, where you can break down data all the way to the ZIP code level.Some of this data is based on Zillow listings (list price, listings with price cut, etc.). This data is updated in the first half of each month for the previous month. Right now on the site, the listings data is from August.But the majority of our metrics are mainly based on public record information. We take into account all public record information on homes, which includes sales transactions. We look at all transactions, including for-sale-by-owner and pocket listings. It can take some time for information about transactions to reach us. They first have to be recorded by the county or city, and then it takes more time for Zillow to receive the information. We get information on some areas of the country sooner than others, but we have to wait until we have enough to do our calculations. This is standard for all organziations that calculate housing data based on public records.Zillow publishes the public records-based information in the first half of any month, for two months prior. Last Thursday, we published data from July. I hope this helps answer your questions.Katie from Zillow

Also interesting to look at what's happening in individual price tiers. If you're looking for a foreclosure in the higher end of prices in your area, you may have an easier time these days. Our chief economist blogged about foreclosures moving up-market a few weeks ago. Top one-third of homes (in terms of value) are now making up almost one-third of foreclosures -- a huge change.