Image via CrunchBase
As a real estate agent, I run across a lot of cool tools. Some of them are great for me to better read the markets and help buyers and sellers to accomplish their goals. Other tools are great for consumers to use while making decisions about buying or selling a home.
I always recommend that both buyers and sellers look at the local market where they are buying or selling. It has a tremendous bearing on whether prices are on the rise or falling, as well as what the competitive environment might be. Looking at a solid CMA (Comparative Market Analysis) for the home (that they are selling or looking at buying) is a great start… but it doesn’t give the wide picture.
Image via Wikipedia
Many buyers and sellers turn to AVMs (Automated Valuation Models) to get an idea of the value of a home. Probably the most well known of these would be the Zillow Zestimate. I have written about Zillow and their Zestimates a few times. Zestimates are amazing tools… within the bounds of their limitations.
While I would quickly point out that Zestimates are a very limited tool in regards to pegging the value of a particular property, one thing I will point out just as quickly is that the Zestimates have given Zillow an amazing database of historical and current home values. And while individual Zestimates are seldom right, I feel that their compiled data is quite accurate (1 house is too small a sample size to be accurate, but 10,000 houses can make them very accurate in pegging the market in general).
I will be incorporating Zillow’s Local Area Indexes into my Market Reports moving forward. I think that they are a valuable tool for you, the consumer, to better assess the market value of homes that you might be considering. Look for charts like this one for various areas within Gwinnett as part of market reports.
Related articles
- Zillow ‘Zestimate’ Shifts, Prompting Howls (blogs.wsj.com)
- Zillow Adjusts Zestimates: Zillow’s attempts at adjusting its complex… (curbed.com)
- Zillow’s Got Cool Tech and Hot Stock, But Does It Actually Work? (theatlantic.com)
