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Calculating Home's Value Online Pros and Cons |
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Written by Mabelle
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Tuesday, 18 July 2006 |
 Checking the estimated value of a home these days is a bit like following stock quotes. To follow the possible changes in the value of their homes, more homeowners are turning to free or nominally priced online tools that spit out a probable home value. Unlike a stock with a daily closing price, a home's value is colored by several variables: neighborhood, the home's condition, the regional housing market, and an agent's or home buyer's rose-colored glasses.
You may have wanted to take out a home-equity loan and also wondered how Seattle's booming real-estate market, along with economic development in the area (a new Home Depot, a new arts center, and park upgrades), affected the home's value.
After getting five estimates, the price range didn't inspire confidence. It appears that part of the problem is that some Web sites we used, including www.instanthomevaluations.com and HouseValues.com, provide only a broad price range and demand real-estate agent contact for a more specific figure.
Agents pay sites for leads and then calculate a home value as a carrot to get your business. Two sites -- www.zillow.com and www.realestateabc.com -- solved that problem by offering a price estimate for any address, without asking to identify the applicants. (Zillow.com is a Seattle startup launched earlier this year by former executives from the travel site Expedia.com.)
You may use one free agent-driven site, HouseValues.com, since agents will email a preliminary price quote without requiring an in-home visit. The HouseValues.com agent emailed only a broad value range: $320,000 to $375,000. Avoiding other agent-driven sites left only a handful of options, so we worked with the free sites Realestateabc.com and Zillow.com, then paid $9.95 for a quote from Instanthomevaluations.com, which generated specific figures instantly.
Realestateabc.com and Zillow.com provided both lists of comparable homes and specific numbers -- $316,000 and $325,087, respectively. Offline, we hired Richard Hagar, an appraiser with American Home Appraisals of Mercer Island, Wash., to price the home.
By M. Sese
http://realestatepress.org
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