Smart Real Estate Investment: Machine Learning Models for Identifying High-ROI Properties in Seattle

Aditya Kasturi^*

Abstract

In this study, we propose and evaluate a machine learning framework for predicting high- return- on- investment (ROI) residential properties in Seattle, Washington, drawing on both structured and unstructured data and informed by robust academic research.

Background & Motivation
Localized forecasting models remain underdeveloped despite the rapid growth and high volatility of Seattle’s housing market. Building on prior Seattle-specific work—such as Zhang (2024) which compared polynomial regression, K- nearest neighbors, and multiple linear regression using Seattle data, finding interior living space and building design to be significant predictors. we extend the analysis encompassing modern ensemble and multimodal approaches.

Methods
We assemble a dataset of 4,600+ property transactions in King County from public records (similar to the Kaggle dataset used by ResearchGate study) .Features include size, bedrooms, lot area, ZIP code, school district rating, transit proximity, crime statistics, and property description text. We engineer structured variables (sqft, bedrooms, age), spatial–temporal lag features, and embed unstructured listing descriptions using transformer-derived NLP embeddings following the multimodal deep learning approach of Hasan et al. (2024). We train and compare several models: Random Forest, XGBoost/Gradient Boosting, and StackingAveragedModels (the latter was top performer in the Seattle case using R² ≈ 0.777, RMSLE = 0.2328). Hyperparameter tuning uses Bayesian optimization frameworks, as recommended in Chen et al. (2023). Model interpretability uses SHAP (Shapley additive explanations) to quantify feature influence

Keywords

Seattle Real Estate, Housing Price Prediction, Machine Learning, Ensemble Models, Multimodal Data, SHAP Interpretability, High-ROI Investment

Corresponding Author

Aditya Kasturi, Realogics Sotheby’s International Realty, USA.

Citation

Aditya, K. (2025). Smart Real Estate Investment: Machine Learning Models for Identifying High-ROI Properties in Seattle. J Cogn Comput Ext Realities, 1(1), 01-15.