Real Estate Investor · New York, NY · Member since 2009 · 7 posts · 1 vote
One would have to be skeptical when you have 3 or four houses in a neighborhood currently for sale or recently sold for 10-20k and the surrounding houses are all over 100k. Is it possible that the higher prices are outdated because they are not recent transactions?
Residential Real Estate Broker · Payson, AZ · Member since 2009 · 3k+ posts · 1k+ votes
17y
I remember when the guy from Zillow came on her trying to defend the site. It doesn't matter how you cut it, Zillow is NOT a great or even a good way to estimate values.
I wouldn't have a problem if someone said they only checked Zillow for the sold's as long as they were recent. The problem with comps whether you use Zillow or any other services is that you can manipulate the comps by choosing some but not all or not choosing certain ones.
My favorite way still is taking only 'solds' for a short period of time(like 3 months tops) and instead of trying to figure or compare rooms and baths blah blah blah, figure out what the 'solds' price per square foot is and that will give you a more accurate and real number as to the value to your house.
Real Estate Investor · Audubon, PA · Member since 2009 · 13k+ posts · 8k+ votes
16y
zillow does selections of comps based on straight-line distance from property under consideration. When is this a bad idea? Say there is a river separating two towns, and that there is only one bridge connecting those towns. A house far from that bridge will be compared to one on the other side that is equally far from the bridge, because a bird could fly a straight line between those houses and they are close by in that way. But for a person, those houses could be more than a mile apart because you have to cross at the bridge; and we know that properties more than a mile apart do not serve as appraisal comps (most of the time).
And then you will have school district boundaries, where houses on one side of a street belong in one district and on the other side to a different district; the one with better school district, lower taxes, etc will have better market value to a normal buyer. What do you think zillow will value them at?
There was some other site that had done a study of some houses and zillow values. One had a missing roof, and was really in sad shape, yet zillow had given it a value far better than a nearby house that had been rehabbed.
And then you can try this experiment the next time you go to rehab some dumpy house. Get the zillow value before you start; because the condition is dumpy, your zillow value will be high. Do that rehab, and you now have a fully fixed up house. I bet the zillow value is now too low, and you could sell for more than what zillow says.
More than enough reason to not use the zillow value as your only measure of value.
Real Estate Investor · Reading, MA · Member since 2008 · 124 posts · 15 votes
16y
last year 2008 , i found zillow to be way off...in my market it was way over priced...however over the last year as each month goes by it gets closer and closer to actual market values on properties...there is always exceptions and you have to know and learn your own market...
i do use zillow but you can't just go off it exclusively...its just one of the tools in my toolbox that i use
like was previously mentioned looking on MLS each and every day in your market is your best tool...i search my market for properties new to mkt, under agreement, back on mkt , solds , reactivated etc each and every day...