Keywords

hedonic index, real estate price index, real estate market

Due to the significant impact that real estate prices may have on overall economic developments, it is necessary to create a reliable index for monitoring the movements of real estate prices. This paper presents the hedonic method, which enables the creation of a real estate price index that in addition to the price takes into account the characteristics of real estate and provides for the estimation of pure change in the price of residential real estate between two points in time. This paper also strives to answer several interesting questions such as: has the sharp increase of real estate prices resulted in the purchase of smaller dwellings, how has the growth of real estate prices affected real demand for housing loans and can databases containing the asking prices of real estate be used to create a reliable real estate price index? This paper also indicates the possibility of the estimated regression model being used in the creation of an expert system for assessment of real estate prices of known characteristics.