571 – Government Statistics Section P.M. Roundtable Discussion (Added Fee)
Evaluating a Commercial Data Source for Use to Estimate Property Taxes
Zachary H. Seeskin
NORC at the University of Chicago
While commercial data sources offer promise to statistical agencies for use in production of official statistics, challenges can arise in their use as the data are not collected for statistical purposes. This paper evaluates 2008-2010 property tax data from CoreLogic, Inc. (CoreLogic), aggregated from county and township governments from across the country, for use to improve 2010 American Community Survey (ACS) estimates of property tax amounts for single-family homes. Particularly, the research evaluates the potential to use CoreLogic to reduce respondent burden and measurement error by using CoreLogic data directly for property tax estimates in place of survey responses. The research found that the coverage of the CoreLogic data varies between counties as does the correspondence between ACS and CoreLogic property taxes. Further, large differences between CoreLogic and ACS property taxes in certain counties seem to be due to conceptual differences between what is collected in the two data sources. The research examines three counties, Clark County, NV, Philadelphia County, PA and St. Louis County, MO, and compares how estimates would change using CoreLogic data in place of ACS responses.