Long time readers will know I don’t post a whole lot of real estate data and charts. Why not? Because to be honest, they are a pain to create, and I’ve never been enthralled with simply embedding standard Excel charts.
Enter this slick new product I discovered at the Blog World Conference – Tableau Software.
It allows a “publisher” (that would be me) to create interactive charts and interesting data displays for readers (that would be you).
For example, below are two graphics. The first is a pretty typical line graph that shows both Phoenix real estate sales over time, and the median Phoenix home value over that same time period (Jan 1999 – Sept 2010 in this case). The second graphic represents the total number of homes by zip code, along with the percentage of homes that are bank owned homes listed for sale. The larger the dot, the more homes in the zip code, and the darker the shade of red, the higher the percentage of bank owned homes listed for sale.
Where the coolness kicks in is that you can hover your mouse over the charts and see the specific data values. As I get more versed in using the software, more interactivity will be available.
For me, this makes generating data displays much more fun than plodding away in Excel. For you, this will (in time and in theory) present you with data and information that is much more useful.
Poke around and let me know what you think!
I'm Jay Thompson, and I have a little blogging problem... 
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