Any Real Estate experts here?

[vjf1968]

Just want to know if anyone here has used Zillow.com for estimates on homes and how spot on are they? Due to some finacial problems I might have to consolidate some debt and I'm preparing for the worst case scenario.

 

[janothebear]

I have been told zillow is pretty good-

Interest rates have a little lower lately; there's talk of the gov't pushing rates down to 4.5% or so as part of the stimulus package.

 

[Steve McGinnis]

I have some experience

I have bought 5 houses in 5 years and around here zillow was pretty much useless. It is my understanding that it is better in some towns/regions. I am in Fort Worth Texas.

 

[bowlfreshener]

I used to be in real estate a few years ago, and I have never heard of Zillow...I don't know if its new, or perhaps of I had heard of it when I WAS selling real estate, maybe I would STILL be selling real estate...LOL.

 

[boris bubbanov]

The "experts" are all laying low right now, not wanting to be identified.

 

[Stubee]

I am no expert but own various real estate (that I actually use, no speculator here).

Zillow has grown beyond what I need but if nothing else can sometimes quickly help you find values of homes in your area via recent sales, I think assessed value, that kind of stuff. That may have some or little bearing on current real sales prices.

That's all I know as I looked out of curiosity and am not buying or selling anything right now. I just spent some time down if FL and can testify that a lot of the 'vacation home' market there is really down...but from some speculative highs.

With real estate, I've always bought--except for one sure "flip deal" with a group of guys--to use it and enjoy it, and if I make any money, fine. Other do the opposite, so be it.

 

[CharlieO]

The "experts" are all laying low right now, not wanting to be identified.

No, that's not it. The world has just realized that there is no such thing as an "expert" in just about anything anymore. Real estate? Finance? Government? Nobody out there has a clue.

Actually, I think I might know a little bit about real estate. I think that Zillow.com is an interesting tool for consumers to play around with, but I will caution you that it can be wildly inaccurate. I must say, however, that I also have found times when I was surprised that their "Zestimate" of a property's value came in almost exactly at the same number I had when I prepared a market analysis for a client.

I don't know exactly how Zillow's estimates are created, but they must draw information from local tax records and maybe even from local MLS records of closed sales. I'm sure that this data is just analyzed by computer, and it spits out a number. This might actually work pretty well when you have a lot of sales activity in a particular neighborhood with relatively stable prices, and you are trying to find the value of an "average" house. There are plenty of things that can throw the estimate out of whack, however. First, remember that this "Zestimate" is based on historical data. In a rapidly-moving market, up or down, I really don't think that their system can keep up with overall changing values. In our market, prices have probably fallen 10 percent since October. In some neighborhoods there have not been enough recent closed sales for Zillow to analyze, so their estimates may be optimistic. Another problem that I see is that Zillow can't account for the value of the view that an individual home has, and in my market that can mean a huge difference in value. In some neighborhoods, a view of a stormwater retention pond (a "lake") can bring a $25,000 to $50,000 premium over an otherwise-comparable home across the street that has a view of other houses. Zillow also can't account for condition, remodeling etc. For these reasons, Zillow's "Zestimates" now include a wide range that makes them not particularly useful.

If it's okay with the moderators, I can show you a Zillow report on a house that I sold last Friday (not Jan.1 as it says in the report):
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5327-Hunt-Club-Way-Sarasota-FL-34238/66762838_zpid/

This is a pretty good one, because it closed for $730,000. The contract was written about 30 days ago, so their estimate happened to be almost right on the money at that time. Notice the value range, however. It's from $564,750 to $752,760. That's a pretty wide spread. I have seen Zestimates where their range didn't even come close to the "real world" value of the home, such as homes that show a range between $1.3 and $1.5 milllion in this market, when I know that you couldn't sell them for a million bucks. As a Realtor, it's tough to take a listing from a seller who knows that his house is worth a million and a half because he saw it on Zillow, but you have a folder full of comparable sales on the same block in the $900,000's. Believe me, I've had it happen more than once.

Here is an example of a "bad" Zillow "Zestimate": I got multiple offers on this one today, far above the high end of their range:http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5516-Lucia-Pl-Sarasota-FL-34238/66769410_zpid/

Play around with Zillow, but ask yourself how accurate it is likely to be in your situation. How much recent sales activity do you have in your neighborhood? What's the current local price trend? How does your home differ from the "average" home?

For the OP, I don't know if you're actually planning to sell your home, but even if you aren't ready to do it today, it wouldn't hurt to contact a local Realtor to get a free market analysis. A smart Realtor will be willing to do it even if you aren't ready to sell, because they'll want to establish a relationship for the future.

 

[vjf1968]

No, that's not it. The world has just realized that there is no such thing as an "expert" in just about anything anymore. Real estate? Finance? Government? Nobody out there has a clue.

Actually, I think I might know a little bit about real estate. I think that Zillow.com is an interesting tool for consumers to play around with, but I will caution you that it can be wildly inaccurate. I must say, however, that I also have found times when I was surprised that their "Zestimate" of a property's value came in almost exactly at the same number I had when I prepared a market analysis for a client.

I don't know exactly how Zillow's estimates are created, but they must draw information from local tax records and maybe even from local MLS records of closed sales. I'm sure that this data is just analyzed by computer, and it spits out a number. This might actually work pretty well when you have a lot of sales activity in a particular neighborhood with relatively stable prices, and you are trying to find the value of an "average" house. There are plenty of things that can throw the estimate out of whack, however. First, remember that this "Zestimate" is based on historical data. In a rapidly-moving market, up or down, I really don't think that their system can keep up with overall changing values. In our market, prices have probably fallen 10 percent since October. In some neighborhoods there have not been enough recent closed sales for Zillow to analyze, so their estimates may be optimistic. Another problem that I see is that Zillow can't account for the value of the view that an individual home has, and in my market that can mean a huge difference in value. In some neighborhoods, a view of a stormwater retention pond (a "lake") can bring a $25,000 to $50,000 premium over an otherwise-comparable home across the street that has a view of other houses. Zillow also can't account for condition, remodeling etc. For these reasons, Zillow's "Zestimates" now include a wide range that makes them not particularly useful.

If it's okay with the moderators, I can show you a Zillow report on a house that I sold last Friday (not Jan.1 as it says in the report):
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5327-Hunt-Club-Way-Sarasota-FL-34238/66762838_zpid/

This is a pretty good one, because it closed for $730,000. The contract was written about 30 days ago, so their estimate happened to be almost right on the money at that time. Notice the value range, however. It's from $564,750 to $752,760. That's a pretty wide spread. I have seen Zestimates where their range didn't even come close to the "real world" value of the home, such as homes that show a range between $1.3 and $1.5 milllion in this market, when I know that you couldn't sell them for a million bucks. As a Realtor, it's tough to take a listing from a seller who knows that his house is worth a million and a half because he saw it on Zillow, but you have a folder full of comparable sales on the same block in the $900,000's. Believe me, I've had it happen more than once.

Here is an example of a "bad" Zillow "Zestimate": I got multiple offers on this one today, far above the high end of their range:http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/5516-Lucia-Pl-Sarasota-FL-34238/66769410_zpid/

Play around with Zillow, but ask yourself how accurate it is likely to be in your situation. How much recent sales activity do you have in your neighborhood? What's the current local price trend? How does your home differ from the "average" home?

For the OP, I don't know if you're actually planning to sell your home, but even if you aren't ready to do it today, it wouldn't hurt to contact a local Realtor to get a free market analysis. A smart Realtor will be willing to do it even if you aren't ready to sell, because they'll want to establish a relationship for the future.

Thanks for the info. I was only looking at Zillow.com to just get an idea. I have no intention of selling I just wanted some idea of the value in case I have to refinance or get a home equity loan. My wife and I have been checking rates over the last 2 months and now we are looking at the value of the house in case I have to do the home equity thing. But I really do appreciate your insight.

 

[echale iii]

My wife and I flipped several houses over the past 5 years, and Zillow has never been particularly accurate as far as we could tell, at least for the markets we were buying/selling in.... I usually look at the comps for a decent estimate to start with, and figure out which way the local market is trending to fine tune it. Houses we've sold generally were on the market for 2-6 weeks before writing a contract, and I was lucky enough to make money on each one...

 

[CharlieO]

My wife and I flipped several houses over the past 5 years, and Zillow has never been particularly accurate as far as we could tell, at least for the markets we were buying/selling in.... I usually look at the comps for a decent estimate to start with, and figure out which way the local market is trending to fine tune it. Houses we've sold generally were on the market for 2-6 weeks before writing a contract, and I was lucky enough to make money on each one...

If you were able to go to contract in 2 to 6 weeks from the listing date, I am impressed. It sounds to me as if you are wiser than most flippers, who are often unrealistic about pricing. The key to successful flipping is pricing the property to move quickly, not holding out for the highest possible price. We have thousands of properties here in Florida that were formerly owned by flippers who held on while their equity disappeared, and refused to accept market value. Now those properties are mostly owned by the banks.

 

[emiller45]

You can use Realtor.com to view sales in your address area. You can get an idea of the value of your home by doing the search and then looking for homes with comparable square footage, bdrm/bath configuration and neighborhood. You could also ask a Realto to do a CMA (Comparative Market Analysis) which most will do for free. The CMA should be pretty accurate with the caveat that the Realtor will be trying for a listing and may be telling you what you want to hear to a degree.

 

[CharlieO]

You can use Realtor.com to view sales in your address area. You can get an idea of the value of your home by doing the search and then looking for homes with comparable square footage, bdrm/bath configuration and neighborhood. You could also ask a Realto to do a CMA (Comparative Market Analysis) which most will do for free. The CMA should be pretty accurate with the caveat that the Realtor will be trying for a listing and may be telling you what you want to hear to a degree.

+1, except that intellegent Realtors are probably not interested in "buying listings" in today's market by over-pricing them. I think that Realtor.com's sold data is easier to use than Zillow.com's estimates

 

[brandt]

Great comments - I work for the largest company in the real estate information and settlement services industry and I can tell you with first hand knowledge that any AVM (automated valuation monitor) product is only a best guess based on many sources of data. They use a very sophisticated algorithm to 'calculate' the house price estimate. However the best algorithm in the world can't be that accurate if the information calculating the estimate is questionable.

If you want the best guess of what your house is worth currently, check the comps for closings in the last 2 months. Anything longer than that is worthless because of our real estate melt down. Be sure that you are brutally honest with yourself on comparing like properties. Little differences in house, sq footage, new vs. old systems etc will make a very big difference in final sale price.

BTW, most of that data is public record and can be had for a quick web search or a call to your friendly Title Insurance Company or your realtor can look it up for you. The source of the data is typically the title company and the local county.

 

[SimpleOne]

Cool stuff. Now why, oh why, did I look at Zillow again? Sigh...lol