Housing Comfort Index and Its Use for Analyzing the Moscow New Buildings Market

This study is devoted to developing a housing comfort index and its application in analyzing the Moscow primary estate market. The data used for analysis were collected as of the beginning of April 2024 from the CIAN, Novostroy-M, and Yandex.Maps websites. Residential complexes belonging to three different segments — comfort, business, and premium class— were analyzed as they are widely represented in the primary real estate market. Initially, a preliminary analysis of the data was conducted, and the impact of apartment characteristics on their price was considered. Subsequently, an aggregated housing comfort index was constructed using two methods: principal component analysis and machine learning. The reliability of the constructed indexes was also assessed and compared with developer classes using cluster analysis. During the analysis, it was established that the classification of some residential complexes by developers was overstated or understated. As a result of the study, a comparison of the constructed indexes was made, and the best one was selected for creating a map of residential complexes in Moscow, indicating their level of comfort.