What does it mean when you read a report saying that in the last year Dover Heights dropped 10% while Bellevue Hill increased by 10%? Nothing.

How can an Actuary of all people say that?

What does it mean when you read a report saying that in the last year Dover Heights dropped 10% while Bellevue Hill increased by 10%?

It means nothing because in the lumpy thinly traded Eastern Suburbs that statistic could be driven by any number of anomalies:

Maybe people in Dover Heights didn’t renovate in the last year.

Or maybe they did but they weren’t the people who sold their places.

Maybe a number of marque properties in Bellevue Hill sold in the last year.

Or maybe a number of marque properties in Dover Heights sold in the prior year.

The market is so thin and lumpy that it is simply impossible to extract the story from the data alone … especially with the limited data that is available. The only way is through immersion and hands on knowledge.