Comm. Comp Database Using MS Access

[Paul Ness MAI]

Does anyone have a template for a commercial comp database using MS Access?

 

[George Hatch]

I do, but it is very cumbersome and I don't use it. I didn't write it myself, but paid a computer geek to do it. One thing I found was that retaining images in the database results in huge file sizes. I guess I could have had it reference an image directory and pull the image every time it loaded, but I was looking for something simple. I'm not familiar enough with Access to work my way through it.

CoStar COMPS supposedly uses an Access-derived template for their printouts, at least that's waht my geek said when he looked at my subscription CD-ROMs distributions. I keep getting solicitations from CoStar for their ARES program, which I think is a large set of Access derived templates. I looked ARES over a couple years back. Most of the templates at that time were geared toward producing marketing materials for brokerage and management companies. I didn't see any that were sufficiently detailed for appraisal uses. They might have something by now. I would say that if ARES has a usable template (supposedly you can also modify theirs or create your own), that might be a better way to go. Especially since you can import data from COMPS into the database. I'm sure it would be cheaper than what I paid my geek for developing 3 specific templates.

If you check it out, let me know what you think.

George Hatch

 

[Tom Hildebrandt]

Paul

I have used and tried several for my own use. Overall I found them to be more time consuming than useful.

The problem was not in deriving a format for relatively simple properties where the data was straight forward. The problem was in inputting the necessary data for all the sales which we recieve. Since one tends to use the sales with the best data, I found that I tended use use some sales a lot, and others I never used even though I spent a lot of time developing the data and entering it into the model. So, you have a data base you spend a lot of time inputting data to keep current but gain relatively little in return for your work effort.

The reason is that it was my experience that what is important in one sale is not important in another, depending on the subject. You need to be able to screen all the sales for the requisite data, but may not have it for all sales. The ratio of these items also matters. As an example, the amount of flood plain may be important in one sale, the floodway in another, the P/S/F may be relevant for the typical warehouse, but the cubic volume or the ceiling height may be the important factor. Writing the model to be able to account for all of these items in a meaningful way was not impossible but difficult, and obtaining the data for all the various fields for all sales was a herculean task. Also, much of the data is time sensitive. If you have a large shop, and you have a trainee wantabe, and you can afford to pay this person a salary, it would be ok, otherwise I found it to be too time consuming.

Regards

Tom Hildebrandt GAA