Alison Porter The Porter Team

Beautiful Arizona

In my opinion, there is no better place to invest in a vacation home.
Low on price per square foot and high on number of days of sunshine per year.

Visit my website for more information on investments ranging from luxury homes
to foreclosure properties in the Valley of the Sun.

www.MyPorterHouse.com

Real Estate information for Gilbert, Chandler, Mesa, Tempe, Queen Creek, Gold Canyon, Fountain Hills, Scottsdale, Ahwatukee & More!

I've been fielding questions recently about how Zillow determines value versus how I determine value. I can't quite seem to figure their system out, but mine is pretty simple. Appraisers chose their comps based on plus or minus 15% of the square footage so I also choose my comps based on plus or minus 15% of the square footage. If it happens to be a neighborhood where the builder left a sizable gap between the square footage of their different models I will take that into consideration and do some extra work to find the value based on subdivision and also area. Then I'll check these numbers with what is selling city wide to educate the client on how their home will fit into the broader spectrum.

In this market it is important to take into consideration repair costs. In every market is is important to take into consideration features and upgrades. That said, the typical homeowner usually values their specific upgrades and features much more highly (read $$) than the typical home buyer. As a professional it is my job to bring those expectations back to reality in a kind but concrete way. Apples to apples comparisons are always the most helpful. Typically having a detailed CMA report including recent solds and current listings with full details and pictures will help to paint the picture, but in some cases it is more helpful to bring the client to competing listings so that they can see for themselves how their home stacks up.

I can say for certain that Zillow does not do this. After doing extensive research for a particularly unique property I decided to log onto Zillow and see how their numbers compared to mine so that I'd know what the homeowner might be hoping for and the results were disturbing. Their numbers were at least $65,000 over market value if not more. On a $650,000 home that might not be that bad, but on a home that should have been valued in the neighborhood of $115,000 that is a huge difference! So I rolled my mouse over the other homes in the neighborhood to see what they were supposedly valued at and I noticed something very interesting. The homes that had been sold recently or were currently listed were all priced according to the current market and seemed out of place. The homes that had no recent market activity had highly inflated prices. Hmmm.

Well, knowledge is power, or so they say but they also say that a little knowledge can be dangerous. In this case both sayings are true. Now I always checkout Zillow to know what I might be hit with at a listing presentation - knowledge is power. Being prepared for an objection and having a response already prepared takes a bit of the pressure off of the situation and comes across as highly professional. A little bit of bad knowledge can be dangerous in the arsenal of the seller, but isn't a problem for the REALTOR who is ready to show and tell their prospective clients how miss-information compares with the facts.