What is Your Home Worth? And How to Find Out.
When thinking about selling your home, its value is one of the biggest factors you consider.
The value of your home will help you decide whether it’s a good time to sell. You want to know how much you will make after selling your home, of course. Choosing the perfect selling price is important. If you price your home too high, it may sit on the market for a long time, and buyers are skeptical of homes that sit on the market for too long. If you price your home too low, you might generate a lot of interest but buyers will think your home is only worth the listing price and you might not get offers for its true worth.
Learning your home’s value is easy and you can take steps to get a better sense of it right now.
Use an online tool to estimate your home’s value
Online estimators use mathematical models and publicly available records to provide an estimate for your home. These publicly available records include things like the year your home was built, the type of home it is, the square footage of your home, how much you and previous owners paid for the house, and how much similar homes in your area have sold for recently.
Keep in mind these estimates rely only on available data. This means if you recently renovated your basement but you never reported this information, the estimator will provide you with an undervalued estimate. If there is not a lot of data available in your area, maybe there a few houses or people aren’t selling, the estimator will be less reliable.
But online home valuation estimators are a powerful tool. They can provide you with valuable information for you to discuss with an agent. The best questions to answer with online home estimators are:
Is the value of my home increasing or decreasing?
Are housing values in my area increasing or decreasing? Is it a good time to sell?
How does my home’s value compare to others in my area?
Check out our list of the best online home valuation estimators.
2. Work with an Expert to Get the Perfect Selling Price For Your Home
Now that you have found an estimate for your home online, it’s time to speak with an expert. Seller agents have more detailed information from large databases and are able to provide you and your home with personalized attention. There’s really no substitute for an expert real estate agent.
Real estate agents will perform a comparative market analysis. This means they will look at all similar properties in your area that sold within the past 90 days (“comps”). A baseline value for your home will be created by averaging the sale prices across the comps.
From this baseline value, your agent can adjust the price based on the unique aspects of your home. Maybe you recently did a renovation of your bathrooms but your neighbors didn’t, this could increase your home value. Agents also have expertise of the preferences of home buyers and do things like adjust your home price to optimize buyers’ searches online.