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Sign up for a redfin.com account, and use their search to find sold records for multifamily units in Dorchester. A quick glance at these results seems to suggest that the zillow figure is in the ballpark.
Zillow isn't too bad for neighborhood averages. But they have no idea if your house is full of mold and falling apart inside or if it's dripping gold from the faucets. All they know is sales of other homes in the neighborhood, square footage (bed, bath, garage), lot size, and pool. So don't use it for more than a starting point.
The issue with FSBO is most people think their house is worth more than their neighbors. If you spent $25K updating, it doesn't necessarily translate into $25K increased value. Realtors know what consumers are looking for and how they value some of the intangibles like flow, lot position, classic style, etc.
Watch your FSBO listing - most buyers will expect you to pass the realtor savings on to them. Just the way it is.
I've been having realtors come in and do comps for us. What an experience!
Our home is in a very stable neighborhood and not many folks sell their homes here. So realtors are having trouble pulling comps for us. They tend to pull well outside our neighborhood, much smaller homes and different type of homes. (We have a 4 bed ranch and they pull a 3 bed tri-level that's 500-700 square feet smaller - I'm not kidding).
We now have a price discrepancy of $40,000 between high and low list estimates.
So one realtor said we should hire an appraiser (she's the one that came in lowest). I said, what if the appraisal says to price our house $15,000 higher than you suggest? She said: "then I will tell you all the reasons why I think your house won't sell for that".
So with that attitude, what's the point of getting an appraisal?
Sometimes it is hard to comp and it's a matter of judgment on what is "in" with buyers right now. The high end of your $40K range is probably someone just trying to get the listing. Easier later for them to ask for a price drop. We have a realtor in our area that is infamous for doing that. Her listings are always way above market, but she gets them and then lowers price after it sits on the market for months. I think it's a disservice to the client because they lose the opportunity for a quick sale and they might be chasing the market down and losing money. But it gets her name on all the signs and helps her marketing program.
I'm not sure for selling FSBO it's worth getting an appraisal since you have input from a few realtors. However, any buyer financing will have to get an appraisal and it will be hard to sell above the appraised level. But appraisers have knowledge of the agreed purchase price when they do an appraisal...
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