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Market signals

Market is a dedicated workflow in Explore Data, Filters, and Rating. It keeps listing, sale, inventory, activity, speed, negotiation, momentum, and buyer-cost signals together while preserving the definition and observation date behind each value.

Plan availability​

  • Free: Prices.
  • Starter: Prices, Affordability, and Skald Indicators.
  • Pro and Expert: Every Market category, including Inventory, Activity, Speed, Negotiation, and Momentum.

The same category metadata drives the Market navigation, API lock state, rating availability, and pricing table.

Current and recent observations​

The age control means maximum observation age, not an average:

  • Current requires the source's latest published period.
  • Past 3/6/12 months chooses the newest non-missing observation within that many published calendar months.
  • A missing value stays missing when that source has no qualifying observation.

The observed period is shown with the value. Some closed-sale signals are published as rolling-three-month observations; changing the maximum age does not change that inherent reporting window.

Composite market fields​

Direct Market fields are never a single publisher's value. When publishers report the same-unit fact, SkaldMaps takes the plain arithmetic mean of the available values and requires at least two contributors. A missing source is ignored; one contributing source produces no field. We do not weight, calibrate, impute, or substitute values. The observation period shows the earliest and latest contributor dates, and each value shows its contributor count.

Where the underlying definitions are not directly comparable, SkaldMaps shows a transparent score instead of pretending the facts are interchangeable. Expand Definition & sources to see the exact formula and credits.

Reported observations can later be revised. A review badge means the publisher marked the observation outside its typical range. A provisional badge marks a current period that remains subject to revision. Flagged values stay visible so maps, filters, ratings, Detail, and Compare use the same fact; the warning supplies context instead of turning the value into zero or hiding it.

SkaldMaps calculations​

Calculated indicators are labeled SkaldMaps calculation and retain their upstream source credits. They include:

  • Market speed: equal-weight inverse percentiles of comparable publisher speed measures, requiring at least two inputs.
  • Buyer negotiation: equal-weight price-cut, inverse sale-to-list, and inverse speed percentiles.
  • Market hotness: a 0–100 score of sale-to-list strength, speed, inverse listings per resident, and three-month listing-price change. It requires every component.
  • Estimated annual ownership cost: annual principal and interest on a 30-year fixed mortgage with 20% down, local effective property tax, 0.5% insurance, and 1% maintenance. PMI, HOA, utilities, closing costs, and the opportunity cost of the down payment are excluded.
  • Required income: estimated annual ownership cost divided by a 28% front-end housing ratio.
  • Buyer cost-of-living index: 60% regional price parity and 40% current ownership cost relative to the national ZIP median; 100 is the national reference.

Fixed-horizon momentum and calculated current indicators do not offer a second age control because their period is already part of their definition.

Sources​

Market surfaces credit Realtor.com Economic Research, Redfin Data Center, and Zillow Research. A field help panel identifies when only a subset contributed. Mortgage-rate inputs come from Freddie Mac through FRED, regional price parity comes from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, and household or housing inputs come from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey.