zillow.com

[Jay_Gatsby]

Don't know if anyone has seen this website before, but I think it's pretty cool in regards to researching real estate values:

www.zillow.com

 

[REWahoo]

Don't know if anyone has seen this website before, but I think it's pretty cool in regards to researching real estate values:

www.zillow.com

Jay, JPatrick beat you to it. He posted this yesterday:

http://early-retirement.org/forums/index.php?topic=5930.msg105146#msg105146

 

[Jay_Gatsby]

Darn...

 

[JPatrick]

Darn...

Yah, you may need to crank your alarm back another hour if you want to keep up with old JPatrick

 

[Spanky]

Thanks. It's good link. My house has the lowest price in the neigborhood. Apparently it does have information regarding the number of bedrooms and square footage.

 

[unclemick]

Interesting - both pre Katrina and where I live now don't seem to be important/in their data base.

heh heh heh heh - maybe I should try Missoula

 

[astromeria]

I got a message saying "We don't support the Safari browser for the Mac."

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Just right click on the site, that'll make it work.

 

[astromeria]

Now that's cute, fuzzy bunny 

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Thats why they pay me the big bucks around here...

 

[Nords]

Business Week just picked up the site:  "Good news for real estate addicts.  On Feb. 8, Expedia.com (EXPE ) founder Rich Barton unveiled his site Zillow.com, which uses public records to crunch appraisals for about 40 million U.S. homes -- all without sharing personal data or meeting with a sales rep.  The ad-supported site crashed repeatedly after heavy publicity attracted swarms of visitors.  But Barton kept cool: Keeping a promise to Zillow's developers, he shaved his head down to a brush cut as a reward for getting the beta version up on time."

No head shots were posted with the article...

"A New Home Site On The Block"

 

[Gone4Good]

The site is cool, but it estimated my condo to be worth about $100K more than I can realistically sell it for. It's probably very good at evaluating neighborhoods but not so hot at individual properties.

 

[tryan]

Zillow is pretty impressive ... came within 10k of my realtors estimate with thier "zestimate" for the 3 SF dwellings I have in the city.

Has trouble in the rural areas though (not enough comps).

 

[Oliver]

Remember to correct for any mistakes in bedrooms, bathrooms and sq ft. I found the ability to pick which properties were comparables very useful.

Oliver

 

[PortlandDiehard]

I think it's good for ballpark estimates. One thing I noticed: The house 3 doors down from mine is exactly the same floorplan, but with some upgrades. Zillow shows their value to be 8% LOWER than mine.

I know I couldn't sell my place for what they're indicating...

 

[astromeria]

I asked my brother, who uses a Windows PC at his office, to run our homes. Mine wasn't in their database (it's about 3.5 years old), but his showed a value that was much too low. He corrected the square footage, number of baths, etc., which raised the estimate almost $200k. The new estimate matched the recent estimate of the realtor who lives across the street from him. He was mighty pleased to see the house he bought for $275k 10 years ago now valued at $700k (he has made a few improvements--new hurricane-resistant windows, turned a screend porch into a real room w/heat & A/C, landscaping). Charleston, SC area real estate has been a good investment recently, but has peaked--pretty flat since last summer with high-value properties down ~5% according to local realtors.

 

[Sarah in SC]

Speaking of Charleston, it didn't have much to show on the sea islands...rural areas are proabably going to improve as they get more data into the system. Although our house (3.5 years old) wasn't in there, it had a huge range for the mile or so around us (from 400k to 800k and a few 2M). Fun to play with...
Sarah

 

[ERD50]

I asked my brother, who uses a Windows PC at his office, to run our homes.

astromeria - The site works just fine on a Mac - but they do require the FireFox browser rather than Safari. I'd suggest downloading it (it is free). FireFox is also very popular on Windows, due to the security problems with IE, so the compatibility is very good.


I don't know if CFB was trying to make a joke about 'right clicking' on a Mac, but you can hold the control key and click - that is the same as a right-click. Or just plug in any USB multi-button mouse, the Mac OS will recognize it - right-click to your hearts content!

-ERD50

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Now we just have to get windows running on a USB multi button mouse and we're all set!

 

[astromeria]

Thanks ERD--it offends my delicate sensibilities to have to install a second browser(!), but I may resign myself to it. I'm reminded of when I was the Help writer for a software product that ran on UNIX, Windows, and the Mac. I had a computer of each type on my desk and kept clicking mouse buttons that weren't there!

cfb, I know about the right-click equivalent, but I use it seldom and keep forgetting whether it's the apple/propeller key, option key, or control key. That must be why I didn't become a programmer--not so good at remembering arbitrary information, epsecailly these days.

 

[kaudrey]

I got this message for my place:

County transactional data for this home is insufficient so we cannot calculate a Zestimate. But we are adding data all the time, so be sure to come back.

Oh, well.