Online home evaluations have been criticized pretty widely in recent times. Today, I decided to put the feature to the test and show you what I found out.
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In recent times, a lot of negative things have been said about online home evaluations. Many real estate agents can’t stand online home evaluation tools, simply because they are not accurate.
Personally, I don’t think online home evaluations as a whole are entirely bad. However, what can we find out about their accuracy is by looking at 10 of the highest-priced homes in Illinois? How does online home evaluations tools compare to real world list price?
Well, after reviewing the numbers, the owners for some of these homes may not be too happy. In today’s modern world, a lot of buyers look online for the supposed "Kelley Blue Book" of real estate. But the truth is that online home estimate tools simply aren't accurate enough for this to be the case.
At the end of the day, the market determines value—not online home evaluation tools. Seller’s should always rely on an appraisal for the most accurate information possible.
But let’s get back to those 10 properties I mentioned earlier. As it turns out, 9 out of the 10 were priced well below asking price. This doesn’t entirely surprise me.
What did surprise me, though, was that 8 of the 10 properties had an online value that came up to just 43% or less of the true asking price.
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8 OUT OF THE 10 PROPERTIES WERE VALUED AT OR BELOW 43% OF THE ASKING PRICE.
Also, only 1 of the 10 online home evaluation's had a home at just 1% of its asking price. That’s a huge difference.
Of the 10 homes we looked at, only 1 actually had a favorable online based value which was above asking price.
So, at least in the case of high-end homes, do not rely on internet based home value tools to determine the value of your property. They are simply way off.
If you have any other questions or would like more information, feel free to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.