Who knows your $hit?

REWahoo said:
Not in every state. I think Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri (some counties), Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming are non disclosure states which do not consider the sale amount a matter of public record.
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Does Zillow work in these states? That is usually where I look up home sales.
 
REWahoo said:
Not in every state. I think Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri (some counties), Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming are non disclosure states which do not consider the sale amount a matter of public record.
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Do they not have property taxes and the associated tax assessor's database?
 
Texan here. Zillow and the county all publish the sales price. In fact with knowledge of prop tax adhustments, you can determine who is over 65, who is a disabled veteran, and surmise just how disabled. Just by looking at the county website. Which you need to do before you buy. Example: ad May say prop taxes last year 8k. But when you look it up, you'll see some categories are frozen and the owner is also a DV. If you are not, and you buy that prop, next year your tax bill may look VERY diff.
 
MrsHaloFIRE said:
Texan here. Zillow and the county all publish the sales price.
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In Texas, the county publishes tax appraisal price, not sales price. Zillow prices are estimates, they do not have access to actual sales prices.

The Real Estate industry has successfully lobbied against making sales prices of real estate public. This way you are almost forced to use the services of a Realtor to learn comparable market values when buying or selling.

Edit: From a real estate website, quoting a real estate agent in Texas...

Here's a list of the Non-Disclosure states, as reported by Realtor.com

http://www.realtor.com/home-values/HomeValuesFaq.aspx#Whichstatesarenondisclosurestates

Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and Wyoming

In these states, the ONLY WAY to secure accurate sold comps, will be through someone who has access to the MLS. No Zillow, Trulia, Public Records, Redfin, Realtor.com, etc.
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I talked to a couple friends several times about how and why I'm keeping my taxable income lower in retirement (as a tax strategy) and their only take-away from all our talks was, "you live like a pauper." One of them said this at a party we attended and she too is in retirement. She totally did not understand the concept of withdrawing from different 'buckets' and how that's advantageous because the IRS doesn't tax withdrawals from regular savings and CDs, unlike they do for pre-tax IRAs and 401Ks.

What her comment told me is she absorbed nothing about what I talked about and that people don't get it. Speaking about your own situation is a waste of breath.

If you want to educate people and help them then talk about how important it is to use 401K and IRAs, why it's good to have a growing nest egg, in other words, advice they can use for themselves. What you're specifically doing and how you're doing it will not make the impact you think it will, and it can cause a lot of confusion and even some resentment.
 
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I’ve spent far too much time trying to educate adults on financial literacy just to realize they nod appreciatively, thank me and don’t change their habits. No more. But with my kids (who are still kids) I take every teaching moment opportunity to help ingrain good habits and mindset. And I volunteer for Jr Acheivement in schools to teach entrepreneurship and financial literacy. Kids are a more receptive audience than grown ups.
 
RenoJay said:
I’ve spent far too much time trying to educate adults on financial literacy just to realize they nod appreciatively, thank me and don’t change their habits.....
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Yup. I recall a conversation with some good friends who are recently retired... but he still works part time. They have ACA health insurance like we do.

She was so proud that they had a platinum level ACA plan... almost puffing out her chest. And then I explained that our health care costs are negligible since we are healthly so we preferred a catastrophic plan since the premiums were so much lower our total health care costs of premiums, deductibles and co-pays were low.

Her husband was intrigued by the idea... I think he "got it"... but she didn't.... in her mind, platinum was the only/best way to go.... even though the premiums for their platinum plan were $15k a year more than the premiums for our plan... all they are doing prepaying a deductible that more often than not they'll never use. :facepalm:

Thankfully, they are both eligible for Medicare now.
 
We keep all our finances in MS Money and have been using it since 1989. My wife has access to this data and it contains all our assets. In addition, we went completely paperless over 11 years ago so all statements are kept on our home network server and backed up onto other media.

As far as immediate family and friends, family members are savvy enough to figure out that we had the financial means to retire early and maintain three homes but they don't know how much we have nor do they care. My childhood friends retired five years ago like I did but we never discuss numbers but they are smart enough to know what it costs to maintain our lifestyle. They have similar lifestyles. They have been to our homes in Florida and Switzerland many times and they are smart enough to figure out that we manage ourselves well financially. For that matter so do they.

As for our other friends and neighbors, they are completely baffled by how anyone can retire early and live in Southern California. Many are older than we are and have been living on the edge and are planning to move out of state after they retire. This seems to be a trend in California, elderly people with almost no savings and younger low income earners who can't afford to live here are moving out of state. More affluent people are moving into California driving up home prices. To me that's a win win situation.
 
REWahoo said:
In Texas, the county publishes tax appraisal price, not sales price. Zillow prices are estimates, they do not have access to actual sales prices.

The Real Estate industry has successfully lobbied against making sales prices of real estate public. This way you are almost forced to use the services of a Realtor to learn comparable market values when buying or selling.

Edit: From a real estate website, quoting a real estate agent in Texas...
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Just for giggles I went into Zillow and looked up recent home sales in my Texas county. Every sale I checked had the sales price. I checked the verbiage looking for words like "estimate" or an asterisk taking me to a subnote saying it was an estimate etc. It was the sales price. I even checked my house and it was accurate. It also listed the source of the info. In every instance, it was the realtor, and provided the realtor's name (and photo). My realtor's comps from MLS always aligned with Zillow. If the realtors are providing the sales price, like they are in my area, do they have an incentive to lie upwards or lie downwards? Both and neither I would say because they want those selling to think they will get a high price and those buying they will get a low price. So I think they incentive is to be accurate. This is my speculation. Now if you purchased a property say early 1990's or something, I would not count on your purchase price being a published number. But if you bought lately, plan on it being public.
 
As for sharing info to help advise others, far from necessary, and as most here have stated - fairly useless to try.
Two friends have asked for advice. One never followed through, the other was already on track to changing his future and really just needed the encouragement that 50 is not to late. He may not get to millions and retired early, but he's now in track to have a few $100K banked and SS instead of SS and debt.
 
The people I shared details with weren't people I was trying to advise, they are childhood friends who are alternate trustees on our revocable living trust, and alternate guardians for the kid. I trust and like them more than most of my blood relatives. ;)
 
I agree with others here that most people don't get it or think they know it all. It is hard to determine if someone is really interested or just being polite.

I wonder how other cultures handle money discussions. How do Germans or French or UK people talk about this? Is it verboten?
 
Lots of comments and admittedly I have only read the first 10 or so. For me, it's stealth wealth all the way. There are very few people who know what we have accumulated in our lives. Early on, I let a handful of friends know of our situation and a couple of them have turned out to be quite resentful in our "status" and makes social outings uncomfortable. I am not out to be a FA for my friends and family, and to be honest, I don't think they want my opinion, anyway. ;)
 
Don't know how all folks from the UK handle it but my family experience is that the Scots hold it very close to their chest. That was my upbringing and from what I could see was common to those with the same background.
 
MrsHaloFIRE said:
Just for giggles I went into Zillow and looked up recent home sales in my Texas county. Every sale I checked had the sales price. I checked the verbiage looking for words like "estimate" or an asterisk taking me to a subnote saying it was an estimate etc. It was the sales price. I even checked my house and it was accurate. It also listed the source of the info. In every instance, it was the realtor, and provided the realtor's name (and photo). My realtor's comps from MLS always aligned with Zillow. If the realtors are providing the sales price, like they are in my area, do they have an incentive to lie upwards or lie downwards? Both and neither I would say because they want those selling to think they will get a high price and those buying they will get a low price. So I think they incentive is to be accurate. This is my speculation. Now if you purchased a property say early 1990's or something, I would not count on your purchase price being a published number. But if you bought lately, plan on it being public.
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I just looked up my home in Texas that we bought in 2014. Zillow's "sale" price is about 10% more than what we paid. Actually, that price was the listing price at the time.

It now values our home at what the County appraises it for tax purposes. We just got our tax statement last week. Zillow is not accurate for Texas or else it would have listed our final purchase price in 2014.
 
Might check Redfin.com. IMHO it's better than Zillow b/c it lists recent sales prices in your neighborhood.
 
MrsHaloFIRE said:
Just for giggles I went into Zillow and looked up recent home sales in my Texas county. Every sale I checked had the sales price. I checked the verbiage looking for words like "estimate" or an asterisk taking me to a subnote saying it was an estimate etc. It was the sales price. I even checked my house and it was accurate. It also listed the source of the info. In every instance, it was the realtor, and provided the realtor's name (and photo).
Click to expand...

Interesting. That conflicts with everything I can find online regarding TX non-disclosure laws. Here is another quote from a real estate website, information provided by a TX Realtor:

You’ve likely heard that Texas is a non-disclosure state when it comes to real estate prices. But what exactly does that mean? In short, prices for real estate sales do not become part of the public record. Sales prices are not listed in any publicly recorded documents nor is the sales prices shared with a governmental agency. Texas is one of about a dozen states that has some form of non-disclosure law. The warranty deed is the legal document transferring ownership of a property that is part of the public record. In Texas, the sales price is not on this document but instead wording something like “Ten Dollars and other good and valuable consideration” is used. If a mortgage is utilized in the purchase, the amount of the mortgage is publicly available in both the warranty deed and the deed of trust. To keep in the spirit of the Texas non-disclosure laws, most of the Multiple Listing Services in the state have rules that mirror the law by prohibiting real estate agents from disseminating sales data to the general public. The sales prices can be shared with clients for purposes of pricing homes, making offers on homes, and other specific reasons, but not publicized in a general manner.
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https://www.realestateinaustin.com/texas-is-a-non-disclosure-state/

TX law does allow real estate professionals to report sales prices to the local MLS service, which is the source of the sales price information mentioned in the last line of the above quote. But Zillow isn't associated with MLS and, according to law, should not be provided with actual sales prices without the consent of the seller. Of course it is possible permission to do so could be buried in the fine print of the agreement sellers sign with real estate agents when listing their house for sale. Who knows...

One more point: Note the word "most" in bold above. Perhaps the MLS service in your county is an exception and isn't following both the spirit and the letter of the non-disclosure law when they provide sales prices to Zillow?
 
Rianne said:
Might check Redfin.com. IMHO it's better than Zillow b/c it lists recent sales prices in your neighborhood.
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Zillow shows sales in your neighborhood, just select the yellow sold icon in the menu, it will show a yellow circle on the map for all homes sold (with price and sold date) within the period selected.
 
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zinger1457 said:
Zillow shows sales in your neighborhood, just select the yellow sold icon in the menu, it will show a yellow circle on the map for all homes sold (with price and sold date) within the period selected.
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Thanks! I did not know that.
 
FYI, “realtor” is an association marketing term...

Very few know much of anything about my finances. A couple of friends have an idea what my yearly “income” is, though most have quite a lot more than me, but only I am FIREd. [emoji41]

My son is not savvy at things financial, though not for a lack of me trying. I haven’t revealed much to him, as he doesn’t really have a frame of reference. Will likely discuss the implications of an inherited IRA at some point, but at that point it’s up to him. If past is prologue, it’ll be spent less than wisely...
 
I believe that I have shared our financial situation with everyone here who has any interest. In my 84th year, I share actual dollars both of assets and expenses with all of my chidren, as well as the manager of our CCRC, as a factor providing our access to further help as needed.
Living in an era where LBYM was second nature, we never measured ourselves agaist our friends and neighbors, With four children and attendant expenses, our material goods... houses, cars and social conections were always in line with our neighborhod.
Retirement at age 53 was not a trauma, and we lived what we considered the good life in Illinois and Florida.
We managed to squeeze in 20 years of army and ready reserves, along with 31 years of retirment

Highest salary in 1984 was 48K, inflation adjusted to about $104 today.

With the exception of some I/bonds, along with long term care policies, a small annuity policy and a few small stocks we have no Pension or legacies.

Social Security along with the above mentioned provides about $52,000/yr in income to offset about $39,000 in expenses.

We have no debt, and no ongoing rentals of property.

So... I guess you could say we share our stuff with others. So far, no problems that I can see.

We live in the nicest, friendliest, cleanest, low traffic and politecommunitires in Illinois.

No secrets.
 
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We haven't told anybody about our finances and don't plan to.

I do all of the finances and supply DW with a monthly spreadsheet update of what we have (and where) and how much we spent that month. Assuming the Kardashian's are not having a crisis, she will occasionally take the 5 minutes necessary to look over what I show her.

Kids know we are doing OK, but nothing specific. They know I have a 3 inch binder with everything they could possibly want to know about our finances (and everything else) in our home safe. At some point we'll probably go over specifics with them, but not yet.
 
REWahoo said:
Interesting. That conflicts with everything I can find online regarding TX non-disclosure laws. Here is another quote from a real estate website, information provided by a TX Realtor:



https://www.realestateinaustin.com/texas-is-a-non-disclosure-state/

TX law does allow real estate professionals to report sales prices to the local MLS service, which is the source of the sales price information mentioned in the last line of the above quote. But Zillow isn't associated with MLS and, according to law, should not be provided with actual sales prices without the consent of the seller. Of course it is possible permission to do so could be buried in the fine print of the agreement sellers sign with real estate agents when listing their house for sale. Who knows...

One more point: Note the word "most" in bold above. Perhaps the MLS service in your county is an exception and isn't following both the spirit and the letter of the non-disclosure law when they provide sales prices to Zillow?
Click to expand...

Not to detract from the thread, but I did want to add that you really can't trust the aggregate RE sites in Texas (Zillow, Redfin, Etc.) as the prices *might* be accurate, but most likely are out to lunch. My DW has been in the RE game for a number of years and has been*always* active in Texas and she get annoyed every other day because of the phrase, "Well, Zillow says.."

These days, she's in the property management business and deals with investors large and small. The institutional buyers are pretty easy to deal with as they trust her (and her team) to make a determination of good buys based on what the market will bear in terms of rent ranges. The smaller investors? They go out and buy stuff willy nilly and get angry w/ my DW when she tells them there is no way that their property will rent for the amount they want...a figure they find on Zillow or such website. And if I were to guess were suckers at one of these weekend RE courses put on by people who have ZERO knowledge of the local markets or disclosure laws. Of course, this is a broad generalization, but the non-disclosure laws make things somewhat a pain in the arse...all in the name of "privacy."
 
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