Money Matters
liz&adam
member
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Property Valuation vs. Appraisal
Hello money gurus. I just got a letter from my county assessor with the valuation of my house at 75% of what it was appraised in October before buying the house. I know this means paying lower taxes which is nice, but I was just wondering if there will be something that could end up being an issue since the values are so far off? The letter came with a thing to appeal the valuation, but I'm guessing that would be if they over-valued the house?
Basically I just want to know if this will come back to bite me since I know my house is worth more.
Re: Property Valuation vs. Appraisal
A few things...
First, an appraisal is only good for 6 months because it is based on comparative values of homes that are similar to the one being appraised.
Second, values used in appraisals are the final sales prices of properties that have sold.
So, if your home was appraised at $250k (made up number) in October, chances are homes that had sold, that were similar to yours, in that time frame, were also around $250k.
As homes sell, home values in neighborhoods change for good or bad.
A tax assessed value (which is what you just received) has nothing to do with appraisal values (these are based on recent sales like I just explained).
So, don't worry about a tax assessment. They often vary greatly from the true values of properties.
Also, sorry to say, but your October appraisal means nothing now. It is outdated. Your home's true market value (if you lised it for sale now) will be based upon whatever home sales prices have been in the past few months (high or low).
To give you a personal example...
DH and I just bought our current home in June 2012. There was a foreclosure on the street that sold for $168k LESS than our sale. Then, the property was flipped and resold for $67k less than our sales price. Due to the two sales being significantly less than our sale, the valuation of the neighborhood has gone down and our home is now "worth" (if we were to sell it today) about $10k LESS than what we paid for it.
The appriasal we had done back in June means nothing.
That's the question everybody wants to know...it's pretty much a moving target depending on recent sales in a geographic area.
Essentially, your home is worth whatever a buyer is willing to pay for it.
If you are not trying to sell, refinance your mortgage, or take out a home equity line or loan, you really don't need to worry about it too much.
It is what it is, basically.
Our paper has a "local" section in it where they print the recent home sales. I keep all the ones that have entries mentioning our neighbourhood. In my neighbourhood all of the houses are generally one of two or three models and I can tell which ones are the same model that I have. This will give you a general idea of what your house is worth.
The only true way to know what your house is worth is to sell it.