4 ms·

At least in the Bay Area, Zillow et al. are decent for getting a decently accurate ballpark figure in mind. A lot of sale prices are clearly put up below market

At least in the Bay Area, Zillow et al. are decent for getting a decently accurate ballpark figure in mind. A lot of sale prices are clearly put up below market to grab attention, knowing that the sale price is very likely to exceed it by a wide margin. Here in many parts of the Bay, you'll get laughed at and promptly ignored if you try and use these "zestimates" to try and put downward pressure on the price. Sellers here have many offers to chose from, leading buyers to compete not just on price, but even dropping certain contingencies to push the deal through.

hbosch 9y ago
A friend was looking at houses via Redfin. The agent told him on day 1 that he should expect to spend 10%–20% more than the online quote, as a rule of thumb. Since then I've taken "Zestimates" with ~65,000 to 100,000 grains of salt.
- Jemaclus 9y ago
  I used to work for Z, and I can confirm that the Zestimate is just that: an estimate. It doesn't know things like whether you did renovations or whether the house next door caught on fire and burned down and things like that. If something about your particular house changed in the last few years, the Zestimate is likely to be way off. That said, it's fairly good as far as comps go, and if you have an average house in the hood, the Zestimate is gonna be pretty close. Regarding the rule of thumb you mentioned, my wife and I have been looking for a house in the Bay Area, and we've determined that the listing price is just a completely made up number. We made an offer on a house that was 100K over asking price, and the sellers countered with 40K on top of that (so 140K over asking). I was like... what? You listed for X, we offered X+100K, you don't get to counter that. lol We obviously didn't get the house, and they wound up selling for 175K over asking price (+~25%). We've made several other offers, and sometimes the house goes for 50K over asking and sometimes it goes for 250K over asking. It just seems to be totally random. It's absurd. Instead, we actually rely a lot on the Zestimate and Redfin's estimate to figure out what the "real" value of the house is. Z and R tend to be roughly in the right ballpark for the Bay Area.
  - djrogers 9y ago
    > I was like... what? You listed for X, we offered X+100K, you don't get to counter that Apparently they do, because... >they wound up selling for 175K over asking price And, as for this: >Instead, we actually rely a lot on the Zestimate and Redfin's estimate to figure out what the "real" value of the house is Let me give you a lesson from econ 101 - the 'real' value of something is whatever someone else is willing to pay for it. If multiple people are willing to pay more than Zillow or Redfin estimate, then the 'real' value is higher.
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]

hbosch 9y ago

A friend was looking at houses via Redfin. The agent told him on day 1 that he should expect to spend 10%–20% more than the online quote, as a rule of thumb. Since then I've taken "Zestimates" with ~65,000 to 100,000 grains of salt.

Jemaclus 9y ago
I used to work for Z, and I can confirm that the Zestimate is just that: an estimate. It doesn't know things like whether you did renovations or whether the house next door caught on fire and burned down and things like that. If something about your particular house changed in the last few years, the Zestimate is likely to be way off. That said, it's fairly good as far as comps go, and if you have an average house in the hood, the Zestimate is gonna be pretty close. Regarding the rule of thumb you mentioned, my wife and I have been looking for a house in the Bay Area, and we've determined that the listing price is just a completely made up number. We made an offer on a house that was 100K over asking price, and the sellers countered with 40K on top of that (so 140K over asking). I was like... what? You listed for X, we offered X+100K, you don't get to counter that. lol We obviously didn't get the house, and they wound up selling for 175K over asking price (+~25%). We've made several other offers, and sometimes the house goes for 50K over asking and sometimes it goes for 250K over asking. It just seems to be totally random. It's absurd. Instead, we actually rely a lot on the Zestimate and Redfin's estimate to figure out what the "real" value of the house is. Z and R tend to be roughly in the right ballpark for the Bay Area.
- djrogers 9y ago
  > I was like... what? You listed for X, we offered X+100K, you don't get to counter that Apparently they do, because... >they wound up selling for 175K over asking price And, as for this: >Instead, we actually rely a lot on the Zestimate and Redfin's estimate to figure out what the "real" value of the house is Let me give you a lesson from econ 101 - the 'real' value of something is whatever someone else is willing to pay for it. If multiple people are willing to pay more than Zillow or Redfin estimate, then the 'real' value is higher.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]