When the final sales data comes in, the hottest real estate markets now are likely to include Colorado Springs, Colo., Charleston, S.C., and Raleigh, N.C., according to a survey released Thursday.

The Pre-Mover Housing Index is a new tool ATTOM Data Solutions of Irvine, Calif., has developed to predict sales patterns in the housing markets.

It recently acquired a database of loan estimates going back to January 2014. It pored over them for addresses of the properties to be purchased, and "flagged" them in the database. It then compared the number of flagged properties to the number of housing units in that area. The national averages for those ratios provide the base (100) for the index.

ATTOM Data Solutions curates a database of more than 150 million U.S. residential and commercial properties with data points drawn from property tax, deed, mortgage, foreclosure, environmental risk, natural hazard, health hazards and Census records.

It compared the loan estimates to existing sales data and found that 62% of the properties sold within 30 days, and 76% were sold within 90 days, said Daren Blomquist, senior vice president for ATTOM Data Solutions.

"What I like about his data is it's predictive in nature," Blomquist said. "A lot of the data is in the first quarter, but a lot of the sales will be in the second quarter."

Among 120 of the nation's largest metro areas, the highest "pre-mover" indices were Colorado Springs (251); Charleston (225); Raleigh (225); Tampa-St. Petersburg, Fla. (209); and Washington, D.C. (209).

"Those are markets that are still affordable, and have good job opportunities for folks," Blomquist said.

Metro areas with the lowest indices told different stories. Some, like San Francisco (22) and Boston (43) are affluent metro areas with some of the highest-priced housing in America and little churn. Others, like Rochester, N.Y. (45), Detroit-Warren-Dearborn, Mich. (48) and Akron, Ohio (50) have suffered major job losses and economic decline.

Nationwide, 3% of all homes with a pre-mover flag in the first quarter were identified as second homes in the pre-mover data. Metro areas with the highest share of second homes were Naples, Fla. (28%), Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla. (17%), Myrtle Beach, S.C. (17%), Sarasota, Fla. (17%) and Portland, Maine (12%).

About 4% of the loan estimates were for purchases intended as investments. The metro areas with the highest shares were Memphis, Tenn. (30%), Indianapolis, Ind. (14%), Cleveland, Ohio (11%), Durham-Chapel Hill, N.C. (10%) and Dayton, Ohio (10%).

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Jim DuPlessis

A journalist for decades.