While the housing market is in recession and is not likely to emerge anytime soon, real estate investment in college towns continues to promise good returns (The Wall Street Journal, September 24, 2010). Marcela Treisman works for an investment firm in Michigan. Her assignment is to analyze the rental market in Ann Arbor, which is home to the University of Michigan. She gathers data on monthly rent for 2011 along with the square footage of 40 homes. A portion of the data is shown in the accompanying table; the entire data set, labeled AnnArbor_Rental, can be found on the text website.

Monthly Rent ....Square Footage

645 ....... 500

675 ........ 648

: :

2400 .......2700

a. Calculate the mean and the standard deviation for monthly rent.

b. Calculate the mean and the standard deviation for square footage.

c. Which sample data exhibit greater relative dispersion?