Auctioning Your Property? No Worries Results From Deciding to Have Your Property Personally Measured
Written by TexasAppraisalTeam Tuesday, 23 October 2007 00:22
Whether selling a property yourself or contracting your property with a professional, the fundamentalcritical component to a effortless deal is an precise depiction of your property’s substantial characteristics in writing. A important stage in the procedure of achieving an precise depiction of your property is achieving an precise computation of gross living area, a important stage that is likely forgotten. As one of the first stages in deciding on a property’s selling amount an professional will provide a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) which reveals selected sales in the specific area. However, without an precise calculation of your property\'s living area, the professional’s CMA will not be very helpful.
In the USA, the majority of real estate professionals establish the price per square foot of a property on living area size. Livable area is defined as the area of a property which is heated and cooled, openly accessed through the interior of the property and possessing the quality of construction identical to the original property. Livable area is taken from the outer walls, not from the interior walls room-by-room. All real estate appraisers are to stick to the ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standards for SFR residential units when finding property area, which recommends actual measurement.
Furthermore, the largely familiar court cases in real estate today is falsification of house size. I’ve been to homes under contract where the property’s items are boxed up and the seller is ready to move only to find out that their house’s gross living area was not precisely represented to start with. The sales agreement then has to be renegotiated or is absolutely voidunacceptable| with no obligation for the buyer to go on with the acquisition. The seller’s property sells for thousands of dollars less. For this reason you should not let the real estate professional to publish your living area based solely on county records, an old set of plans (which can and are changed sometimes during the years), or an estimate of what the typical property size in your subdivision.
Here is a scenario: A 1,500 square foot property is offered for sale @ 12345 Fox Run Drive. The property is offered at $120/sf x 2,000sf = $240,000. Rather than actually measuring the property to find an precise living area, the livable area was acquired relying upon county records. The property gets a purchase agreement for $240,000. However, the appraiser turns in his appraisal showing 1,840sf and an appraised value of $220,800, some $19,200 less than the purchase price. The sellers are told that they will have to renegotiate the sales amount because the living area is actually 1,840sf, not the stated 2,000sf. The sellers go off and sue the former owners for misrepresentation of living area.
Can this really occure in transactions? Certainly and it does. For this reason it is so important to have your property measured by the professional listing your it, whether by owner or by professional, or preferably, by an appraiser. After doing so, you will have actual verification of your actual living area.
Unlike a real estate agent, an appraiser has no vested concern in what amount for which the property sells. Appraisal fees are based on amount of work to create the report and not a percentage of the sales amount. Therefore, a professional appraisal can often help homeowners yield the best decisions setting a accurate sales price for their propertys size. Whether you’re considering listing for sale by owner or through an professional, it is always a good idea to get an appraisal prior to listing your property.
Article Source :
This article was written by William Cobb with the assistance of Chandler Smith. Mr. Cobb heads Accurate Valuations Group and has worked as a residential appraiser for 15 years now primarily in the Greater Baton Rouge, LA market area. For more information on William Cobb and Accurate Valuations Group, visit Baton Rouge, LA Appraiser. Chandler Smith is an adept real estate professional in the Houston, TX area. He runs Houston Real Estate Appraisal
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