Price Checking Zillow…Sold Real Estate Prices in Lane County

In 2007 when I first heard of Zillow its “zestimates” were almost always wrong, and usually on the high side. This made it hard when I’d tell a seller he should list his house at $xx and zillow told him it was worth $yy.  So I thought I’d try again with several different types of properties, areas, and prices. I used homes that closed in the last few days.

• 90040 VALLEY VISTA DR, Elmira: Country property, 12+ acres, 2100 sq. ft. Zillow says it’s worth $330,000, or a range of $277k-359k.  It just sold for $365k, after 40 days on the market at $385k. Zillow was -35,000.
• 76867 RIDGE DR, Cottage Grove: Also country, but just .74 acres, 1900 sq. ft. Zillow says $263,000, range of $218k-284k. It just sold for $290,000 after 87 days on the market starting at $295,500. Zillow was -27,000.

Playing with Zillow

Most people we know acknowledge that Zillow is not the place to find the value of their home.  It can be fun to mess around with, but is more often wrong than right.  We like to check it against just sold homes every once in a while.

Tonight we chose 7 homes that sold last month in different areas and price points:

• 1693 Adelman sold: $239,900  Zestimate: $271,500
• 1342 Manzana sold: $290,000  Zestimate: $312,500
• 3060 Grand Cayman sold: $485,000  Zestimate: $556,000
• 85017 S. Willamette sold: $775,000  Zestimate:  $680,000
• 1175 Oakway Rd. sold:  $510,000  Zestimate:  $371,000
• 3550 Glen Oak sold:  $325,000  Zestimate:  $333,500
• 279 Roan sold:  $290,000  Zestimate:  $268,000

As you can see, 4 sold for less than their Zestimates (though one was very close), and 3 for more than their Zestimates, (2 for much more).  Zillow appears not to have given any value to the acreage on the Willamette St. property.   The Oakway Rd. property is a good example of what happens because they don’t know values of specific areas.

Zillow doesn’t know where one neighborhood ends and another begins, or where a desireable school’s boundaries are and doesn’t seem to adjust at all for ages of homes.  This is obvious in areas such as College Hill, where Zillow will compare desireable older homes in the South Eugene High School district to average off-hill homes in the Churchill High district.

In short, where Zillow does best is in large subdivisions of similar homes built at the same time; suburban areas where the houses are all surrounded by like homes.