Signals & Measurement
We're Changing to a "Proof First" Business Model
Bottom line: we sell a type of lead only if the homes behind it have sold at three or more times the baseline sale rate, how often a home picked at random sells. Every type we sell prints that rate, its window and its range. Anything that measures lower comes off the menu, and pre-probate is sold as a provisional group rate until it has been measured over the same six months.
We started the way a traditional lead provider does. Records were sold by area and by how recent they were, at one price for every record, with no odds on any of them. A buyer worked each record as if it were as good as the last. The measurements say they are not.
The bar
"Times the baseline" is a comparison. It is how often homes with this record sold, divided by how often a home picked at random sold over the same window. We judge the measured figure and print its range beside it.
| Lead type | Measured | Window | Sold |
|---|---|---|---|
| Probate filing, St. Charles County | 5.4x (3.7 to 7.6) | six months | Yes |
| Death on record, no probate case yet, St. Louis County | 6 in 100, against a baseline of 2.8 in 100: about twice | about twelve weeks | Provisional |
| Probate filed over a year after the death, St. Charles County | about 2.3x | six months | No |
| Court foreclosure filing, St. Charles County | 2.6x (1.4 to 4.8) | six months | No |
| Money judgment against the owner, St. Charles County | 0.71x (0.36 to 1.36) | six months | No |
The pre-probate figure counts a change of owner on the county roll, not a priced sale, over a window about half as long as the baseline's, and its range sits above the baseline but its multiple is under 3. We sell it as one provisional group rate for the whole lane, due to be measured again by April 2027. We say all of this here so you do not have to find it. The foreclosure and judgment figures compare each group with its own matched control group, not with the baseline sale rate.
The odds belong to the type
Each rate describes a type of lead. Every record in that type inherits it. We do not put a number on one house, and a 5.4x tells you what usually follows a probate filing, not that your record will sell.
What it saves
Take probate in St. Charles County. A case filed within three months of the death sold about 19 times in 100 within six months. A case filed more than a year after the death sold about 6 times in 100. Selling both at one price, as one list, sends the same hours to very different odds. The second kind is now off the menu.
Leading from the front
We measure a lead type before we sell it, we publish the types that failed, and the menu follows the measurements rather than the other way around. Each figure above is frozen with a version date. A later measurement is published as a new version, never as an edit to this one.
We would rather be checked than followed.
Measured on St. Charles County (probate, foreclosure, judgments; figures through June to August 2026) and St. Louis County (pre-probate; July 8 to October 2, 2026) public records. Probate, pre-probate and late-filed probate are read against the baseline sale rate for their county: every single-family home in St. Charles County, and a random sample of 2,804 homes in St. Louis County. Ranges are 95 percent intervals. The late-filed probate figure is 6.1 percent against the 2.6 percent St. Charles County baseline.