I have heard of people watching the Zestimate value of their current home like it is a stock market ticker symbol. While the Zestimate tool can be convenient for getting a ballpark idea for the value of a home, your home’s value doesn’t work like the stock market and Zestimate is not accurate enough for that, especially in Idaho. Why not in Idaho? We live in a “Non-disclosure State,” which means the sale price of a house is confidential. Given that, real estate websites and their algorithms have to use financial assumptions and old data, among many other factors, to provide the calculation. This causes Zestimate to have a much larger margin of error in Idaho than in disclosure states. Whether you are buying or selling, keep in mind we’re in a non-disclosure state and a real estate professional is your best bet for estimating a home’s current market value.
*This is to help explain the difference between a disclosure and non-disclosure state. It is not an exhaustive list of what goes into Zestimate or any other similar type of real estate valuation program. Margins of error and valuations can vary greatly. Refer to the websites’ own legal documentation for information around their practices, promises and guarantees.