can I use my failure to predict the appreciation on my personal home I bought 12 years ago to help just a commercial property to invest in?
TL;DR I'm trying to figure out if there is any method to reliably predict the appreciation of a property since I'm beginning to think/prepare to make a purchase and am now looking back at the disappointing appreciation my home has seen since I bought it 12 years ago.

In 2009 when I bought my house, I took a much more cautious approach than I had previously seen or have since seen from anybody I have met and known personally with which the subject had ever been broached. I had already made the decision to buy and started saving when the recession made buying all that much more attractive. I was single and living in an apartment, and the general mindframe what that renting was money I'd never get back whereas owning was just transferring my cash into an asset. So while I was buying a house to live in and to be a long term residence that I would be happy with, I tried to educate myself with the process and do as much research as possible to approach it like an investment as well. I'm reasonably happy with my house which I think is as much as just about any homeowner can say, just a few minor gripes, but as of today the area I live in has seen some of the slowest appreciation of not just this city/metropolitan area, but also the state, and I just can't understand why.

I want to leave out my specific location/city/state, cause I think that information has to potential to illicit bias and I also don't think that it's relevant, I'm not trying to compare appreciation in new york to LA, I'm trying to compare 5th st to 50th st. But here's a general rundown what I looked at:

don't remember where the specific info came from, I could go find it again if it really mattered, but I don't think it actually matters because it was reasonably accurate enough and the only thing I think that matters for the purpose of this post is to point out what information was taken into consideration and giving the general "picture" I used when choosing property.

I also don't know if this can go without saying, and don't know the correct terminology for the various components, so I just feel compelled to make sure this is understood. When I reference nearby cities and "metro area", I think this is pretty common for most major cities but there are cities themselves, inside of the city there are some areas or neighborhoods which have their own aspects of municipality such as their own cops (and thus additional expenses such as tax or a different utility provider) but which are wholly contained inside the actual city, and then there are independent cities which are so close that the actual boundaries between the two cannot be observed just by driving between them since there is no break in the density of businesses or housing. I settled on a house that is outside of one these minor municipalities contained in the city itself, but still inside city limits (much closer to the city limit line than the the center of the city), and within a mile or two of one of the neighboring independent cities limits that is a part of the metro.

school districts, on a scale from 1-10, the highest rated school districts in the state scored a 9, there were less than 10 of them in the entire state, and there was only 1 place in the entire state where the borders of two of these top-score school districts met one another (at the time they actually overlapped and kids living in my house would have been able to go to either district).

I'm in the largest city in my state, and of the various tax districts I'm not only somewhere around the lowest 1/3, but also lower than the taxes in all the neighboring towns that make up the greater metro area.

utilities, not 100% but I believe the utility rates are the same throughout the city, but some of the neighboring cities are higher rates, for example there was recently an issue where the city close to me in the metro area increased the cost of water over 400%, if you watch the news in my area that should tell you where I live, people less than a mile away saw drastic increases while my bill stayed the same.

property value, the city closest to me is considered one of the highest average property value cities in the state.

crime rate for the neighboring city was actually a bragging point for the state as it has been ranked as lowest in the nation more than once and is consistently in the top 10, the area I live is rated as one of the lowest in the city. The reason I'm pointing out both is because people living in my area are actually closer to the major locations of the neighboring city, so for shopping and such they will often go there, matter of fact most people mistake my area of town as being a part of the neighboring city.

access, this area is comparatively lower traffic than most cities with easy access to interstates, highways and toll roads within a couple miles and one of the easiest areas in the entire metro to commute to/from for work or travel.

at the time I bought the house, there was LOADS of development going on nearby. If I use the size of my neighborhood and the number of homes in it as a reference, then I'd ballpark 10-15k new homes in a 3 mile radius on a half circle from my house, and a large number of shopping/dining/entertainment venues and business properties on top of all that.

initial cost, my home was a new construction and I was the first owner. it was a developed neighborhood where approximately 1/8th of a mile section had been purchased and the developer came in and just filled it up with houses to sell. I actually bought the house before the construction was 100% complete and was able to dictate a couple of minor details (had the kitchen plummed for gas stove in addition to electric and such, no floorplan changes). the initial price per sq/ft was probably close to but below 50% of all the new houses being built just because they were building entire neighborhoods at specific price points (my neighborhood was in the 150's, a mile down the road was one in the 120's, a mile past that was 220's, with all houses in each neighborhood being +/- 10k or 15k). but a more useful comparison is for the entire metro, the only way you could find anything for a lower price per sq/ft was "needs work" or bad neighborhoods or something similiar, for the price these houses seemed like hard to beat deals.

these were the highlights and there were others but when I researched all this stuff it just created this multi-circled venn diagram that all overlapped on one particular point and I found a house perfectly in my price range that left no box unchecked in terms of what I was looking for in a house (3 bed, 2 bath, 2 car attached garage with nice front and back yard in a nice family oriented neighborhood that looked nice to walk around in with features like ponds and park areas....).

it seemed like such a good fit that I thought I'd missed something or looked up stats with some bias in mind or was the target of some evil scheme that I was being gas-lighted to setup. I bought it and have been completely happy, my experience and observations living here for 12 years have 100% backed up all my original research. So satisfied that I never really cared how much appreciation I'd made since I was never concerned with selling, but I have been wanting to buy some commercial property as investment, so going forward the appreciation and getting the value right will be that much more important. I'm wanting to buy property for rental as passive income as opposed to buy and sell to cash in quickly of good appreciation, but since rent is determined of value, it's still important. But with the recent news of crazy housing shortage and people having to bid WAY over asking prices to get homes, I started looking into it. I realize commercial and residential are two different beasts, but a lot of the same principals apply so I'm just looking for any explanation I can get. To be clear it's not REALLY a complaint, like I said I'm happy with my house, and it's also not me being bias and thinking my house should be worth more than it is and not happy it's not worth as much as I think it should be. The issue I'm trying to figure out is that with all the research that I did into all the major points I listed above and much much more, I would have expected this area to be one of the fastest/best appreciating areas in the city, but in reality it's actually one of the worst. I've learned this looking at housing prices, talking to other people, stuff like that, but an easy reference is the heat maps on neighborhoodscout.com, my area is 1 step up from the lowest in the area and literally encircled by high appreciation and I'm completely baffled. There hasn't been a high rate of sales like people were fleeing an area on the decline, it wasn't overpriced to begin with, the qualities of everything I listed out have stayed high and only improved if anything.....I just don't get it, where did I go wrong if anywhere and how do I more accurately determine the potential for appreciation going forward?
[{"id": "h0r812n", "text": "Regional home price appreciation depends on employment growth, flat/declining interest rates and not having real estate and insurance increase significantly faster than inflation. \nChicago/Cook County is an example of how home prices are depressed because real estate taxes are so high compared to other parts of the country.\nThe areas I see having significant price appreciation based on these factors are Nashville, Charlotte, and  Raleigh due to their huge population growth and reasonable real estate taxes, and not having a major insurance risk with hurricanes or earthquakes.\nCity location specific home price appreciation depends on identifying an area that is gentrifying. Find an area that is getting an influx of new restaurants, home renovations, and possibly reinvestment from the city to improve the area.", "replies": [{"id": "h0whyew", "text": "Agreed. Appreciation is generally driven by broader macroeconomics of an area.", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0r86tt", "text": "NeighborhoodScout.com", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0r8dsw", "text": "There is a profession that just does that research past data. The broker will charge by the hour per hour rate often used for court case. Much of that is on tape not available to public. I will start with a licensed broker.", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0r8imb", "text": "Yes.  Buy an AVM (automated valuation model) with a strong track record.", "replies": [{"id": "h0r8mti", "text": "How do I judge an AVM's track record?", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0red80", "text": "Ngl didn\u2019t read the whole post, but in my experience, the only investment properties of mine that have consistent appreciation are historic buildings located in historic townships. For these properties, appreciation alone is enough to offset inflation plus another .5-1.5%. If you are considering investing in a commercial property, I\u2019d strongly recommend finding one in an opportunity zone since you can completely eliminate capital gains as long as you hold onto that property for at least 10 years. Pretty sure you can 1031 money into an opportunity zone fund too if you\u2019re selling off an asset...", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0rqnfm", "text": "Home appreciation is based on similar size, square foot, bed, bath, garage, even level of interior like granite, hardwood floors, etc. \n\nLook at sold homes in the 3-6 months with your sqf, bed and bath then estimate the interior is  below, equal or above yours.  Then it's a little guess work. \n\nI read the first paragraph but really skipped the rest as it seems like a story.", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0s3qt2", "text": "TLDR", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0t1asb", "text": "Agreed with VulcanMind1. Keep in mind that real estate operates in ~40 year cycles. It\u2019s only been 12 years since the bottom of the last cycle. So you\u2019ve got time to realize the big boom...\n\nAlso, you mentioned that your property was built in the middle of a development boom with plenty of other houses in similar price points and utility. If the schools, taxes, area amenities, etc are the same across all of these ... there\u2019s frankly no reason for your property to gain massive appreciation versus the others. 3-4% year is average with all kinds of factors mentioned above weighing on that. \n\nYou may need to be creative in how you use this first asset to help buy the second. Maybe explore a cash-out refi and use that as a down payment on the second (and rent/Airbnb the first one to cover the bills+) and think differently on how you execute your strategy to get more properties.", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "h0twn76", "text": "If your home hasn't appreciated much since 2012, you must be in an area where appreciation is low but cash flow is relatively high. In the past, commercial has followed residential on a 2-3 year tail (behind). Things are much different right now, but with increased costs to build, it is possible you will see more appreciation. \n\nI have noticed in the past few years that CAP rates have been low in even non appreciating markets, which makes your quest even more difficult. I would lean towards a property that is close to good traffic areas and potential growth (by universities, downtown locals with growing population or potentially in an area that is being revitalized).", "replies": [], "depth": 1}]