Using Images as Covariates: Measuring Curb Appeal with Deep Learning

arXiv:2403.19915v1 Announce Type: cross
Abstract: This paper details an innovative methodology to integrate image data into traditional econometric models. Motivated by forecasting sales prices for residential real estate, we harness the power of deep learning to add "information" contained in images as covariates. Specifically, images of homes were categorized and encoded using an ensemble of image classifiers (ResNet-50, VGG16, MobileNet, and Inception V3). Unique features presented within each image were further encoded through panoptic segmentation. Forecasts from a neural network …

abstract arxiv cs.cv data deep learning econ.gn forecasting harness homes image image data images information measuring methodology paper power q-fin.ec real estate sales type