On the Hunt for an “Average House Price” in East Aurora

When you do a web search for “average house price in East Aurora,” you come up with a lot of good, not-so-good, and just plain lame information. If you were looking for a general idea of what the current market says that homes like yours in your neighborhood are worth, the results are likely to be more amusing than anything else.

You always come up with the national sites’ average listing price for homes for sale in the Southtowns. Depending upon how recently their data engine found and tossed out duplicates and errors, and that can be an interesting number. You will also get state real estate trends, a list of average sold prices (this one seems to be subject to error); an instant, somewhat dubious calculation for the average price per square foot of a house in East Aurora; and ads. Lots and lots of ads. But almost all of the “averages” are affected by listings and/or sale prices for “lot/land for sale” and the like…hardly useful unless your own house has recently disappeared. Likewise, unless your property is a weekend getaway chalet, any “charming, quiet cabin” listings will send the “average house price in East Aurora” calculation seriously awry.

On a recent web excursion, I did stumble across a great cartoon presentation at the CNN.com site. It was an animation that showed how the average American home has changed over the past 40 years. The graphics show a typical house as it expands, contracts, adds features and loses them (the fireplace disappeared about 10 years ago: who knew that?).

With a tip of the hat to creator Bard Edlund, here’s a synopsis of the highlights:

1973 found the median new single family residence at 1,525 square feet.

A mere seven years later, air conditioning and a fireplace had appeared…anyone familiar with the era might be forgiven for retrieving the mental image of President Nixon’s Oval Office fireplace roaring while the air conditioning blasts away…

In 1984, George Orwell’s’ predictions aren’t totally in place, but the square footage has stretched to 1,605, and the average house price is $79,900. Ten years later, the house has expanded to 1,940 square feet, average house price is $130,000.

That “average house price” growth is pretty convincing: the narrator backtracks to point out that “the median sales price has gone from $64,600 in 1980 to $169,000 just 20 years later.” Alas, even though the cartoon doesn’t show a wrecking crew tearing it out, “the fireplace disappears in 2007” (there’s still one in the White House, though); “right before the house contracts during the economic crisis.” Then the recovery: by 2013, the average price of $268,900 supports a house having 2,384 square feet of space: 56% larger than the house of 40 years ago.

The animations and commentaries are diverting—and asking Bing or Google for the average Southtowns house price does get you a raft of information—but if you are seriously pricing our current East Aurora market, a specific detailed search right here on my site will get you a lot closer to the information you need. And if you are considering the sale of your own home, you deserve a professionally researched comparable analysis—the kind performed by an experienced, licensed area Realtor^®. That’s me, and I’d be pleased to perform exactly that kind of thorough-going ‘comp’ for your property, with no obligation attached. And you don’t have to search further: I’m just a phone call away!