Hey I was wondering if anyone knows of any web sites where I can find accurate property values?
I actually just posted about comps in my blog. It’s in my signature. If you dont have access to the MLS, you want to probably try realquest.
Thanks for your blog, good information. I was checking out the prices at realquest.com:
Silver ($39/month)
Nationwide Property Search
Estimated Value For All Properties
Nearby Sales For All Properties
Listings With Pictures
Foreclosure Data Elements
Gold ($79/month)
All what Silver has plus…
Enhanced Property Data
Platinum ($149/month)
All what Gold has plus…
Appraiser-Quality Data
Robust Comp Filtering
I agree realquest or haines (if you have it in your area) These are the best services for comps
What about Zillow? Its a free site and I have heard the info on all comps site including Realquest come from your county court house and they can be months behind in records. If this is the case what’s the diffrence between pay sites and free sites? Or have I been told wrong?
The only way that you are going to get true comps is to make friends with an appraiser. These comps are based off of recent home sales of similar type. All of the previously mentioned sites are usually based off of tax values and are not a true indicator of value.
What’s your opinion about appraising as an art form and if you were to use 5 different appraisers to work on one property, you will get 5 different numbers?
All of the free sites are way off. The data is too old. Realquest and haines are the best paid sites. I do not use these myself but I know several full time investors who swear by them. (especially haines) Your county does have to be up to date for them to work good. I would not go as far to say you have to have an appraiser. I use the MLS for comps and that is just fine for me. I only consult an appraiser after we are under contract.
My opinion is yes 5 diff appraisers will give 5 different values 
Thats or local real estate agents.
MLS comparables are the way to go. You can use www.zillow.com but definitely get MLS comparables and a CMA from a local agent.
Instead of a website, a good thing to do is to establish a relationship with an appraiser or two.
Some appraisers offer basic search services where they will do a computer look up for you and give you a value range based on recent comps in the area of the subject property for 25.00
I now have a relationship with one in my area. I can send her a property and she will do a search and look up the comps and tell me the value range. I have to pay her 25.00 a look up
I think this is better than zillow and those other sites and my info comes from someone who knows the areas I buy in pretty well. Additionaly she invests as well.
See if you can find something like this.
Forget Zillow, good for photos, recent sales and general info but no good for apprasials. I follow sales not MLS listing and the 2 are way off. I have found some off by more than 100k.