Mortgages depend significantly on the value of the property that is involved. Consequently, it become important to know how much a property is worth before heading into refinancing plans, looking for a home loan, or selling a house.

One way to do this is to determine the market value of the property. A simple way to do this is to look at other comparable homes in the same neighborhood and see what prices they have been sold recently. One of your Carolina Living Realtors can assist you with this and will come at no cost to you.

Another way to find the value of your property is to find its appraised value. To do this you need to pay for the help of a trained and licensed professional. They will take into account a variety of factors, including the home’s square footage, construction quality, floor plan, design, surrounding neighborhood, proximity to important services and locations, as well as the landscaping, among other factors. An appraiser will usually cost anywhere between $200 and $300. In the current Lake Norman real estate environment, appraisals have become pivitol in the actual sale of the property. Short sales and foreclosures in the Lake Norman area have caused some of our appraisal values to decrease causing transactions to fail to close.

An appraiser can also tell you the replacement value of the property. This is how much an appraiser estimates it will cost to build a similar house on an unoccupied lot. The appraiser will take the age of the home into account to make a better estimate with deterioration and depreciation in mind.

One important thing to note is that a home’s estimated value is not the same as its worth. A home’s estimated value is defined by one of the methods listed above, while its worth is eventually established by what potential buyers are willing to pay for it.

Some things we have experienced in the Charlote and surrounding areas.

• Tax value does NOT determine value of the home. It has nothing to do with market value.
• Neighbors do not know the value of a home. Of course they are wanting values of homes to be very high.
• Current list prices of homes, while helpful, do not determine the value of a home.