How To Appraise Your Home

Appraising an Under Improved Home

If you're doing an appraisal on a home that has not been updated in a while, or the home appears the be well worn, then appraising the homes condition is a necessary portion of the appraisal that needs your focus. As explained in the book: "How to Appraise Your Home" homes that are under improved or distressed need to to be aligned with sales of homes in similar condition. This is often difficult to properly access due to the difficulty in accurately assessing the interiors of these properties and in the non-realistic assumption that we would entering comparable homes anyway.

As mentioned previously, you need to see your home not as a loving owner, but with scrutiny, as a skeptical buyer, picking out the items that needed to go. A new kitchen, baths, carpet, drywall.. the list can go on and on. How much do these items cost? Appraisals are never dollar for dollar, they are based on what the market is will bare at the time of the appraisal. Are buyers fighting to get houses and bidding up prices? Then improvements probably don't even matter. Are homes spending 6-12 months on the market getting little action, then your improvements probably won't do much more than unload the home. 

In the book, "How to Appraise Your Home" you'll see exactly what improvements are the best to do and may give you the best opportunity to the highest dollar to dollar ratio for you investments. You'll also see through our list of monetary adjustments, what kind of adjustment to make on a comparable home within each line item. 

"How to Appraise Your Home" also shows you how to gather information for the internet, old MLS listings and Realtors. Doing these things in the wrong way will get the door slammed on your backside, back by using the techniques shared in the book, you'll be getting more help then you could've asked for.

Under Improved Home Tip:

I strongly suggest that you read "How to Appraise Your Home" and make some of the most necessary improvements to your home based on the tips and advice within the book. If you have a realistic outline of the improvements that you are going to perform, the 'real' level of quality that will be reached after the improvements are completed, and the current market value of homes offering these types of improvements, then you can appraise your home as if these improvements are already done. 

Do not simply add the costs to your estimate of value because it will be wrong. You may get more or less on your investment of improvements done to your home, depending on your location, and the quality of the improvements that your market is showing you.

i.e.; if you live in a neighborhood where "everyone" has granite countertops and you have Formica, then your home is under improved, even if your Formica countertops are brand new, and you get a minus.  The book explains this in greater detail.