Systems and methods for improving the liquidity and distribution network for real estate and other illiquid items are provided. These systems and methods include the trading of futures and options contracts, which will provide the liquidity and distribution network (103) for real estate. Possible embodiments of these systems (100) and methods include the trading of futures and options contracts related to real estate. Another embodiment of this invention includes generating indexes for real estate, housing values, mortgage prepayments, or for anything with from sufficiently liquid points of value. Another embodiment of this invention includes a centralized data base for retrieving closing and current auction prices for determining the value of, and best method for the auctioning of various items. The data provided by this data base would improve liquidity by creating greater price transparency.