Monday, March 26, 2007

Washington Real Estate News and The Zillow Sweet Spot

Zillow is one of the most interesting sites on the Internet, Washington Real Estate News reports, as far as its attempt to evaluate vastly different properties and augmenting that service with features like aerial maps and listings for sale in the area to first bring in potential buyers with a cool service like home values and then selling them something through the additional services offered. However, the information available is only reliable in relatively homogeneous areas and cannot replace the ability of a real estate agent to either determine the value of your home for sale or pinpoint areas a potential buyer’s budget will allow a home purchase.


Those homes that see their value most accurately reported by Zillow are those that are easily comparable to homes near by for approximate value, Washington Real Estate News reports. Homes located either in rural areas where there simply aren’t many nearby homes to use as comparable properties or those that lie in neighborhoods full of homes that vary wildly in appearance and amenities will see value estimates that could fluctuate significantly from their actual value.


Where a real estate agent can accommodate these types of homes by using the human touch to dig deeper for comparable homes or modifying a Washington Real Estate News valuation in accordance with the information available, Zillow’s software program does not have that advantage. If homes nearby are not reliable for determining a value, the estimate produced could be vastly different from the kind of value a real estate agent’s comparative market analysis would derive.

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