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Looking for some advice. I have been thinking of selling my home for some time now and so I've been watching on Zillow, Trulia, Realtor.com, etc., as to my home estimate. My next door neighbor and I built our homes at the same time in 2004. Our homes were the same price except ours was $100 more. They are not identical, theirs is two-story, 3000 sf and mine is a one-story house, 2800 sf and a very popular floor plan, so much so the builder stopped building it because everyone wanted it and they were having a hard time selling the other floor plans.
About eight years ago my neighbors did some upgrades to the house (iron backyard fence, screened in porch and some updating inside) so their house estimate over the years got to be about $25,000 more than ours.
In the last three months I've noticed my house has begun to decrease every day from thousands of dollars to hundreds. My neighbor's house has steadily been increasing and recently shot up about $40,000 almost overnight. Their house on both zillow and trulia is estimated to be $71,000 more than mine. I asked them if they had done any recent renovations or done anything to the house and they said no, and they didn't know about the estimates online. They seemed as surprised as I was. I don't get it. We're in the same subdivision, next door neighbors and their house is shooting upward and mine is going downward.
Our subdivision has a lower priced section, a mid-priced section and a higher priced. We are in the mid-price area. I noticed on Trulia that my comparables include a house from the lower-priced section, 700 sf less than mine, 3,000 sf less property. Mine backs up to preserve with no homes behind me, and that one has homes behind it. I didn't know where the other homes were, they are not in our community. My neighbor's home had comparables from the mid and upper range homes in the neighborhood. I just can't figure out why my house is getting lower and lower in value. I'm getting nervous because it's like a slow bleed out that just won't stop. Any ideas?
I'm getting ready to do some upgrades like a new HVAC, new flooring, new appliances and some repairs to the house in preparation for selling it. Will this help the value of my house to increase? Will r.e. agents do comparables based on my house and not houses that are not real comparables?
You are looking at scam sites which post online appraisals to trap leads for real estate agents who pay to tap into the traffic on those sites.
The errors are legion, and confusing or costly to people who take the appraisals seriously.
Their algorithm is pulling data from the neighborhood and doesn't appear to be set to discard a much smaller house. I'm getting ready to sell my house and they have it listed about 15% lower than market as comps we pulled showed. I'm in a neighborhood with widely divergent lot and house sizes and build qualities. In five blocks my street goes from million dollar houses to 200k houses and $200 sq.ft. to $95.
Your agent should do real comps on similar sized houses in similar parts of town with similar finishes.
Quit trying to determine the value of your house from online estimates. Online estimates are unreliable, to say the least.
Don't go overboard on upgrades. It's unlikely that you would recoup your investment but it may enable you to sell your house more quickly. Basic repairs and cosmetic fixes are fine. Get some local opinions as to the desirability of doing any major upgrade. Generally, if your HVAC system is working properly I would advise against replacing it.
Nobody's house is like a liquid, homogenous stock that can fluctuate in value daily
In short, quit bothering yourself with ANY online or automatic valuation.
If yours is a ranch, desirable plan (still desirable today), desirable lot, and in current condition (no need for major repairs, the HVAC, roof, water heater all within 5 or so years), then your market value and time to sell will be great.
I bought a house in 2016 and the same house sold not far from mine for very close to what I paid. Zillow just sent me a thing saying my house had increased in value about 18%. The other house is valued at about 60% of mine according to Zillow. Those are computer generated values and not very good ones at that.
Thank you for all the great advice. I feel better now. I'll work with a realtor to help me determine what my house should sell for and what work I should do and what I shouldn't bother with. Have a great 4th!
We sold our house in 2016. Before we did, I was following the "value" on Zillow. Our next door neighbor had sold a year before for $219,000. Our Zestimate was $190,000. We put it on the market (after getting it ready, some minor yard work, hardwoods refinished and interior repainted) for $249,000. It went under contract the next day for over asking. Just keep in mind that it's an estimate and they have no idea how many improvements you have made.
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