Firm to Keep Its El Toro Housing Data to Itself

A leading real estate information company will no longer make public the results of its research on housing values near the proposed El Toro airport because of the heat the company has taken since it began the study early last year.

Dave Ross, vice president of Anaheim-based Experian, said the response has become increasingly “vitriolic” from both sides of the contentious debate over the proposed airport at the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

He said he no longer wishes to spend time defending the firm’s credibility and that he’s bothered by frequent misinterpretations and misrepresentations of the data.

“It became troubling,” he said of the reaction to the findings. “They were killing the messenger.”

Experian, an information services firm formerly known as TRW, began releasing its El Toro housing data in April 1997 and has revisited the research twice since then. Its last study, made public in January, concluded that housing values in the areas nearest to El Toro have been increasing at a slightly faster rate than in the rest of the county.

Ross said he and his 12-person staff received dozens of phone calls and letters on the issue. Some airport opponents challenged the methodology used in the study and accused Experian of being aligned with pro-airport forces, he said.

Some airport proponents also took issue with Experian’s findings, saying the data greatly underestimated the increases in housing values around El Toro. Ross said he also was disturbed by comments about the study in various published reports.

“People on every side of the issue are wearing their emotions,” he said.

The study was undertaken independently and without any bias, in an attempt to shed some light on the issue and as a way to raise Experian’s profile, he said. But he now thinks it’s distracting too much from the work his department does for paying clients.

Experian’s latest study found that in the last six months of 1997, single-family homes within a 7-mile radius of El Toro appreciated by an average of 4.1%, compared with a 2.4% increase elsewhere in the county.

Over the two-year period ended last December, the properties near the air station rose in value by 3.9%, the firm said, while they were up 2.4% countywide. The findings are statistically significant within a 95% degree of certainty.

The study tracked 1,661 randomly selected single-family homes in the El Toro area, including parts of Irvine, Laguna Hills, Lake Forest and Portola Hills. It also tracked 1,726 houses in other areas of the county. The samples were similar in terms of the types of houses included.

Experian used an automated method of determining real estate values that it has developed for its commercial clients such as banks and appraisers, and which mimics the appraisal process.

Using sales data from comparable properties no more than half a mile away, and information on individual characteristics of the houses being studied, the computer program came up with an estimated market value for each house in the study.

It did find some differences within the 7-mile radius. Those houses within about a 3-mile radius appreciated only 2.8% during the six-month period, and homes from 3 to 4 miles away rose 2.3%. The biggest increase was in houses 5 to 6 miles away, which gained 7.6% in value.

Ross said his staff also received criticism from some real estate appraisers, who believe that the appraisal process is “more of an art than a science.”

John Karevoll, an analyst at Acxiom/Dataquick Information Services, which also tracks the housing market, said the methodology used by Experian is good for determining past changes in real estate values but isn’t good at predicting the future.

He is hoping to do his own research on El Toro housing values, but said he’ll only do it if he feels confident of producing meaningful results.

“It’s a tough little nut to crack,” he said. “No matter what methodology you use, you’re just not sure if the conclusions you reach are valid or not.”

Ross said that Experian will continue its research. The results might be made public again when the outcome of the El Toro issue is more certain and if “more definitive results” about its effect on housing values could be obtained, he said.

The firm also might resume releasing the data if it is able to align itself with a university or other institution viewed by outsiders as independent and credible, he said.