Location, location, location

Jul 18, 2019 Latest News

Centrality Index: Synthetic view on place performance through activity patterns

"Location, location, location" is the number one rule in real estate, and often the most underestimated. Big data from connected devices and location-based apps provides insights on status quo and future trends of locations. [PropLocation]

Habidatum has been working to use this data, transformed into synthetic metrics, to inform location-specific decisions in real estate and urban planning. Centrality Index is the first and most important metric of this kind. The article explains it in more detail.

Competitive places within a city

The rapidly changing reality of urban life strongly affects the idea of an optimal distribution of functions and services in cities. Businesses or construction sites for new residential or office development are strongly influenced by people’s diverse and dynamic lifestyles. For instance, the concept of a home area where a person spends a significant amount of time is becoming less common, as travel behaviour shifts from regular commuter trips to more random mobility patterns, and working areas become more distributed around the city. All that leads to complexity in predicting places that concentrate the demand for real estate, infrastructure, jobs and services.

As a result, the idea of a stable catchment area, the core of conventional site selection, is losing its relevance for both businesses and real estate developers who do not want to lose time and money targeting the wrong audience.

In the meantime, renovation and revitalization of cities’ central districts and peripheral industrial zones reinvent these areas for locating new businesses. Among all, after regeneration they form a new type of retail and recreation experience, creating a strong alternative to shopping malls and downtown retail avenues. The growing trend of co-location (complementary functions located together) add uncertainty to the understanding and management of competition: people stop choosing between brands/shops, and prefer to select between places. These places consisting of a set of shops and cafes, architecture, local communities, lifestyles, sentiments and media images become the main competitors in the city. To find the right place is not just to determine the point with the least competition and sufficient demand for a certain business type or retail chain. Proper location is about choosing a position that localizes the maximum set of components of a "comfortable" place for the target audience.

Full analysis here.

This analysis is part of a series of publications resulting from FIABCI's partnership with Habidatum.

About Habidatum

Habidatum is a software and data analytics company, assisting policymakers and businesses in understanding the hyper-dynamic urban environment through advanced analytics of diverse data sources driven by machine learning and interactive visualization.

Habidatum operates as a gateway between the professional communities who require data-driven insights and data carriers.

The company was founded in 2014 by a collaboration between professional urban planners and digital designers. Since 2014, the company has worked in more than 20 cities globally including London, New York, Moscow, Dubai, Singapore, Pune, Denver, and Miami.