Average and median price of an apartment: why the numbers are different

The two metrics answer different questions and respond differently to high-value transactions.

Average price

The arithmetic average is obtained by dividing the total cost by the number of objects. If an expensive penthouse is included in a small sample, the result may increase significantly, although the prices of most ordinary apartments have not changed. Therefore, along with the average, the composition of the sample is important.

Median as an example

Conditional prices of five apartments: 1, 1.1, 1.2, 1.3 and 4 million dirhams. The average is 1.72 million, the median is 1.2 million. Both calculations are correct, but one reacts more strongly to an expensive object. The example illustrates the method, not the UAE market.

What to compare

Do not compare the mean of one report with the median of another as a single series. For the selected apartment, it is more useful to further study objects that are similar in size and characteristics. Even the median does not eliminate differences between areas and building quality.