Property Worth
A common mistake that some people make when trying to sell their home is selling it offering it for the wrong price. Whether you are selling too high or too low it can cost you money. If you aren't aware of the value of your home and list it too low you could be leaving a lot of money on the table for someone else to pick up. On the other hand, if you try to list your home for more than its true market value you may find that you are paying on the mortgage and insurance far longer than you anticipated. Either way could potentially cost you thousands of dollars.
So how do you determine how much you should sell your home for? The easy answer is to bring in an appraiser to give you his best estimate. This is how most people determine the value of their home. Most appraisals are extremely accurate but the prices are based on the last few sales in your neighborhood and could be a little inaccurate. The best way to know for sure is to assist your appraiser with his or her job. Although you won't be able to convince all of them, if you have compelling evidence of what your home is worth, there are a few who will take your findings into consideration.
Before you hire an appraiser, you should get a few comparable prices for recently sold Bay Area real estate. You can often get this information online by going to your Bay Area tax assessors website. Use a service like Zillow to find out the addresses of some of the recently sold homes in your area and look them up online. This should be a home similar to yours that is within a mile or so of your own property so you want to look at the description of the property if it is available. Zillow will often offer this information so it may be easy for you to discover.
Once you have your information in hand call an appraiser and let them do their job. They use a similar method for determining the value of your home so the results should be similar with a good appraisal. When they are finished, compare what you found to the appraisal they are giving your home. Look to see if they came close to your estimate. If they did, then you and your appraiser have done well. If you feel that their appraisal is under the average price for a home similar to yours, you can show them the homes you found and ask them if there is any reason why they couldn't adjust their estimate according to the ones you found. Keep in mind that you only want to do this if it will make you more money.
This method gives you a better idea of what you should be listing your property for and why it should sell reasonable well at that pricen but it also helps getting the right home insurance. By getting involved with the sale of your Bay Area home you can be sure that you are selling at a fair price.
