The taxation of property based on market values requires frequent appraisals for a large number of properties. In light of the recent property tax reform discussion in Germany, it has been argued that a valuebased tax therefore cannot be implemented at a reasonable cost. In several other...

We use Adaptive Weights Smoothing (AWS) of Polzehl and Spokoiny (2000, 2003, 2006) to estimate a map of land values for Berlin, Germany. Our data are prices of undeveloped land that was transacted between 1996-2009. Even though the observed land price is an indicator of the respective land...

Compared to other asset classes, information on transactions of residential real estate is scarce and available only with delay. Listing information from web-platforms is abundant and timely. Is listings data useful for research? We examine this question and find that distributions of ask and...