U.S. Real Estate Transactions and Assessments from 1996

Over 400 million public records from more than 2,750 U.S. counties, covering deed transfers, mortgages, foreclosures, and property characteristics for approximately 150 million parcels. It is sourced by Zillow from a third-party provider and supplemented by their County Direct program, with temporal coverage varying by county but generally sufficient from April 1996 onward.

Use Cases

• Analyze deed transfer and mortgage patterns across 2,750+ counties to study regional real estate market cycles.
• Model property valuations using historical assessment data and property characteristics for approximately 150 million parcels.
• Track foreclosure and tax delinquency rates over more than 20 years to assess economic distress in specific geographies.
• Study commercial and residential property transaction volumes using detailed public records spanning decades.

Strengths

• Extremely large scale with over 400 million detailed public records.
• Broad geographic coverage spanning more than 2,750 U.S. counties.
• Long temporal depth, with sufficient sample sizes for most areas from April 1996.
• Includes data for approximately 150 million parcels across 3,100+ counties.

Limitations

• Temporal coverage varies greatly by county, with some records only available from the mid-2000s.
• Contains inherited data gaps from third-party sources due to varying county recording procedures.
• The dataset is very large, requiring researchers to plan for downloading specific geographic subsets.

Provenance

Source

Zillow, via a major third-party provider and their County Direct program.

Collection Method

Aggregated from county assessor and recorder's offices, supplemented by Zillow's County Direct initiative.

Time Range

Varies by county, with sufficient coverage from April 1996 for most areas; some records extend to early 1990s.

Freshness

Updated approximately twice per year.

Geography

United States, covering more than 2,750 counties.