The following appeared in a letter from a homeowner to a friend.
"Of the two leading real estate firms in our town — Adams Realty and Fitch Realty — Adams Realty is clearly superior. Adams has 40 real estate agents; in contrast, Fitch has 25, many of whom work only part-time. Moreover, Adams' revenue last year was twice as high as that of Fitch and included home sales that averaged $168,000, compared to Fitch's $144,000. Homes listed with Adams sell faster as well: ten years ago I listed my home with Fitch, and it took more than four months to sell; last year, when I sold another home, I listed it with Adams, and it took only one month. Thus, if you want to sell your home quickly and at a good price, you should use Adams Realty."
Write a response in which you examine the stated and/or unstated assumptions of the argument. Be sure to explain how the argument depends on these assumptions and what the implications are for the argument if the assumptions prove unwarranted.
The prompt recommends the listing of home property available for sale with Adams since it sells faster and has offered better selling rates. It cited that by referring to the higher number of agents with Adams and higher average sales of Adams and higher average revenue of Adams. However, the recommendation may not present a cogent case since it is rife with holes and fissures. Before it can be properly evaluated, following unstated assumptions must be tested and verified.
First of all, do higher number of agents with a company mean faster selling at better price? May be not. For instance it may happen that Adams has higher number of agents because it is covering large geographical area and it has wider presence but the sales figures for these agents per square feet/area they are covering is lower than that of Fitch. Further, it is also incorrect to assume that higher number of full time agents would help in getting the good deal. It may not be. For instance, it may likely that these full time agents are shirking their duties by being incapacitated or being sick but part time agents of Fitch are able to get good details for their clients. Therefore, if both the hypothesis are true, then the argument is significantly weakened.
Secondly, does higher revenue last year denote clients will get good deal always? Of course not! Since it may happen that Adams got higher revenue last year because of few very big deals such as 2 or 3 houses worth millions, however Fitch got lower revenue because it was dealing only in affordable housing. Further, it is also unjustified to assume that higher revenue in last year of Adams would outdo Fitch in coming years and it had outdo Fitch previous 5 years as well. Since it may happen that prior to last year the revenue was much higher for Fitch but due to change in business regulations, it suffered. If both the probabilities are true, then the argument does not hold the water.
Thirdly, does average tell the overall performance? Statistics had proved that average is a misleading figure if data has outliers. Therefore, it may happen that Adams got higher average revenue because it sold few houses worth more than USD 300000 but Fitch got sales of USD 145000 for all the houses. Therefore, Fitch may be more reliable. Further, the time period of 4 month in selling a house 10 years ago may not be comparable to that of last year since it may happen that 10 years ago the economy was going through crisis, and buyers were not in position to buy therefore it took 4 months. But last year because of boom in the economy Adams sold the house in just one month and it may happen that Fitch would have sold the house within 3 days. Therefore, unless the time period and inventory turn out is not fully reliable and comprehensive, it cannot be used effectively to support the argument.
In conclusion, the argument as it stands now is considerably flawed due to its reliance on several unwarranted assumptions. If the home owner is able to offer the test results of above hypothesis and offer more evidence perhaps in the form of average revenue per agent and average revenue per size of an area and comparable locations they are covering, then it will be possible to fully evaluate the viability of the argument.
Comments
Essay evaluation report
Attribute Value Ideal
Final score: 4.5 out of 6
Category: Good Excellent
No. of Grammatical Errors: 0 2
No. of Spelling Errors: 0 2
No. of Sentences: 26 15
No. of Words: 575 350
No. of Characters: 2646 1500
No. of Different Words: 245 200
Fourth Root of Number of Words: 4.897 4.7
Average Word Length: 4.602 4.6
Word Length SD: 2.363 2.4
No. of Words greater than 5 chars: 179 100
No. of Words greater than 6 chars: 116 80
No. of Words greater than 7 chars: 67 40
No. of Words greater than 8 chars: 36 20
Use of Passive Voice (%): 0 0
Avg. Sentence Length: 22.115 21.0
Sentence Length SD: 13.785 7.5
Use of Discourse Markers (%): 0.885 0.12
Sentence-Text Coherence: 0.288 0.35
Sentence-Para Coherence: 0.467 0.50
Sentence-Sentence Coherence: 0.067 0.07
Number of Paragraphs: 5 5
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 3, column 414, Rule ID: EN_COMPOUNDS
Message: This word is normally spelled as one.
Suggestion: fulltime
...correct to assume that higher number of full time agents would help in getting the good d...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 522, Rule ID: EN_COMPOUNDS
Message: This word is normally spelled as one.
Suggestion: fulltime
... For instance, it may likely that these full time agents are shirking their duties by bei...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 606, Rule ID: EN_COMPOUNDS
Message: This word is normally spelled with hyphen.
Suggestion: part-time
...y being incapacitated or being sick but part time agents of Fitch are able to get good de...
^^^^^^^^^
Line 5, column 438, Rule ID: HAD_VBP[1]
Message: Possible agreement error -- use past participle here: 'outdone'.
Suggestion: outdone
... outdo Fitch in coming years and it had outdo Fitch previous 5 years as well. Since i...
^^^^^
Line 5, column 438, Rule ID: HAVE_PART_AGREEMENT[1]
Message: Use past participle here: 'outdone'.
Suggestion: outdone
... outdo Fitch in coming years and it had outdo Fitch previous 5 years as well. Since i...
^^^^^
Line 7, column 373, Rule ID: CD_NN[1]
Message: Possible agreement error. The noun 'month' seems to be countable, so consider using: 'months'.
Suggestion: months
...reliable. Further, the time period of 4 month in selling a house 10 years ago may not...
^^^^^
Transition Words or Phrases used:
also, but, first, however, if, may, second, secondly, so, then, therefore, third, thirdly, well, for instance, in conclusion, of course, such as, first of all
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance on Part of Speech:
To be verbs : 30.0 19.6327345309 153% => OK
Auxiliary verbs: 20.0 12.9520958084 154% => OK
Conjunction : 21.0 11.1786427146 188% => OK
Relative clauses : 13.0 13.6137724551 95% => OK
Pronoun: 44.0 28.8173652695 153% => Less pronouns wanted
Preposition: 62.0 55.5748502994 112% => OK
Nominalization: 13.0 16.3942115768 79% => OK
Performance on vocabulary words:
No of characters: 2712.0 2260.96107784 120% => OK
No of words: 574.0 441.139720559 130% => OK
Chars per words: 4.72473867596 5.12650576532 92% => OK
Fourth root words length: 4.89472135074 4.56307096286 107% => OK
Word Length SD: 2.46580617147 2.78398813304 89% => OK
Unique words: 250.0 204.123752495 122% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.435540069686 0.468620217663 93% => More unique words wanted or less content wanted.
syllable_count: 860.4 705.55239521 122% => OK
avg_syllables_per_word: 1.5 1.59920159681 94% => OK
A sentence (or a clause, phrase) starts by:
Pronoun: 8.0 4.96107784431 161% => OK
Article: 4.0 8.76447105788 46% => OK
Subordination: 7.0 2.70958083832 258% => Less adverbial clause wanted.
Conjunction: 2.0 1.67365269461 119% => OK
Preposition: 5.0 4.22255489022 118% => OK
Performance on sentences:
How many sentences: 25.0 19.7664670659 126% => OK
Sentence length: 22.0 22.8473053892 96% => OK
Sentence length SD: 72.4107837273 57.8364921388 125% => OK
Chars per sentence: 108.48 119.503703932 91% => OK
Words per sentence: 22.96 23.324526521 98% => OK
Discourse Markers: 6.32 5.70786347227 111% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 5.15768463074 97% => OK
Language errors: 6.0 5.25449101796 114% => OK
Sentences with positive sentiment : 10.0 8.20758483034 122% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 8.0 6.88822355289 116% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 7.0 4.67664670659 150% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.0864101486004 0.218282227539 40% => The similarity between the topic and the content is low.
Sentence topic coherence: 0.0268002540236 0.0743258471296 36% => Sentence topic similarity is low.
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.0345756794296 0.0701772020484 49% => Sentences are similar to each other.
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.0529112090056 0.128457276422 41% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.0307977779051 0.0628817314937 49% => Paragraphs are similar to each other. Some content may get duplicated or it is not exactly right on the topic.
Essay readability:
automated_readability_index: 12.3 14.3799401198 86% => Automated_readability_index is low.
flesch_reading_ease: 57.61 48.3550499002 119% => OK
smog_index: 3.1 7.1628742515 43% => Smog_index is low.
flesch_kincaid_grade: 10.7 12.197005988 88% => OK
coleman_liau_index: 10.39 12.5979740519 82% => OK
dale_chall_readability_score: 7.53 8.32208582834 90% => OK
difficult_words: 102.0 98.500998004 104% => OK
linsear_write_formula: 8.0 12.3882235529 65% => OK
gunning_fog: 10.8 11.1389221557 97% => OK
text_standard: 11.0 11.9071856287 92% => OK
What are above readability scores?
---------------------
It is not exactly right on the topic in the view of e-grader. Maybe there is a wrong essay topic.
Rates: 16.67 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 1.0 Out of 6
---------------------
Note: the e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.