“How much is my home worth?” This question is asked of me daily by friends, family members, clients, and even other brokers. This is in fact the million-dollar question, no pun intended.
The quick and dirty answer to this question is, “Whatever a buyer is willing to pay”. Now, that answer is very tongue and cheek. Is the home worth $1 because someone is willing to give that to you? Of course not. It simply means the value will be determined by the person purchasing the home.
Now, the more complex answer to the question: “How much is my home worth?”
As professionals, we have developed tools and a thorough evaluation process unrivaled to our competitors and fellow real estate brokers to answer that simple question.
First, like any other analysis, we must look at the property. What does it offer? I.e. it’s size, property style and type, age of construction and of course, location. Secondly, we weigh the pros and cons of the condition of the home. What remains to be renovated and updated to the features that have already been done. Once we’ve established the quality of the home, we gather critical market Information. Market information refers to factual information gathered by Centris (Quebec’s MLS), Realtor.ca, the APCIQ, and Matrix (a search engine reserved for brokers). Once the information is gathered, we review the ups and downs of prices, the average asking price by month, sold prices compared to the asking price, the time the property remained on the market, and how the city evaluation comes in to play (that in itself is a whole other topic).
Together with the subject property, with data and recently sold comparables, we are able to put the pieces together to give you a property evaluation specific to your home and the current market. Final tuning of the price will be determined between the broker and seller to personalize a strategy. Perhaps asking 1-2% below property value to create multiple offers or completing home renovations to add an additional $10,000 in property value. Both pricing strategies will have positive or negative effects on the time the home will remain for sale.
Some people might ask more commonly today, “How do I price my home in this market?” The narrative may have changed, however the answer remains the same – look at the data, derive a strategy, monitor the ongoing and quick changing market, and adjust. The impacts of this pandemic and global crisis are ones we cannot take lightly. We would be remis to say that here in Montreal, well, this has been positive. Supply is low, demand is high and mortgage interest rates are reasonable. This equals a strong real estate market.
With years of experience and hundreds of homes sold, our team of realtors have experienced buyer’s markets, seller’s markets, economic crashes, high interest rates, and even low interest rates. One thing is for certain, there is always a buyer for every seller and the price will be determined between the two of them.
Richard Sholzberg