For owners and sellers
What is my home worth, and what should I do with it?
Start with a current estimate of your property's value. Then decide what it means: sell as-is, improve first, or keep it. An estimate is a number. The decision is what you keep, and which of the three paths gets you the most of it.
Automated values are a starting point, not an appraisal. They estimate from public and market records without seeing condition, improvements, or what makes your property different. A reviewed valuation accounts for those and states what it could not verify.
Why the estimate is not the decision
Sellers are told a price. They are rarely shown the proceeds.
Price is not proceeds
Payoff, commissions, transfer taxes, concessions and pre-sale repairs routinely reach 8% to 10% of the sale price. Comparing a sale price to a purchase price answers the wrong question.
An estimate cannot see inside
Condition, updates, layout, systems at end of life and permit history all move the number materially, and none of them appear in the data an automated model reads.
Selling is one of three options
Improving first and keeping the property are real alternatives with their own numbers. A valuation that only answers “what would it sell for” is half the analysis.
Your three paths
Compare them on the same numbers
Each path is decided by a different figure. Run the numbers yourself, or have us assemble the evidence behind them for your specific address.
Sell as-is
Open the sell vs. keep calculator
Price it where the market has actually closed, accept the condition discount, and keep the proceeds without carrying a project. The right answer when the repair list is long relative to what buyers here will pay for it.
Improve first, then sell
Open the renovation cost calculator
Spend selectively where the work removes a buyer objection or protects the appraisal, then list. Worth doing only when the expected lift in sale price clearly exceeds the cost and the weeks it takes.
Keep it, or rent it
Open the rental property calculator
Hold the property and let cash flow, principal paydown and appreciation compound — if the equity trapped in it is genuinely earning its keep against what the proceeds could do elsewhere.
Property Intelligence™ for sellers
What a reviewed valuation contains
Built from verified records, the comparable sales that actually closed, anything you share about the property, and our review of its condition.
Reconciled valuation
The automated estimate placed against the comparable sales that actually closed, with the adjustments for your property's condition and features written out.
Net proceeds
What you keep at several price points, after payoff, commissions, transfer taxes, recording fees, concessions and pre-sale repairs.
Repair priority
The work worth doing before listing, ranked by what the market here pays for it — and the work that will not return its cost.
Pricing strategy
A range rather than a single number, with the tradeoff at each point: days on market, buyer pool, and the likelihood of a price reduction.
Sell, improve or hold
The three paths compared on the same set of numbers, so the recommendation is a comparison rather than an opinion.
What is still missing
Every gap stated plainly — interior condition, permit history, lease terms — with what would close it. We never fill an unknown with an assumption presented as fact.
Questions owners ask
Before you list
How accurate is an automated home value estimate?
An automated estimate reads public records and recent sales. It cannot see condition, updates, layout, views, or deferred maintenance, so it is usually a range rather than a number. Treat it as the starting point of the conversation, not the answer. A reviewed valuation reconciles the estimate against the comparable sales that actually closed near you and states what would move the number up or down.
What will I actually keep if I sell?
Net proceeds are the sale price less loan payoff, commissions, transfer taxes, recording and attorney fees, seller concessions, and any pre-sale repairs. In most transactions those costs land between 8% and 10% of the sale price before payoff. The price is the headline; the proceeds are the decision.
Should I make repairs before listing?
Only where the market pays for them. Work that removes a buyer objection — roof, systems at end of life, obvious moisture, safety items — usually returns its cost because it protects the buyer pool and the appraisal. Cosmetic upgrades past the ceiling of the block rarely return theirs. We price the repair against the expected change in sale price, not against a national return-on-investment table.
Is it better to sell or keep the property as a rental?
Compare the net proceeds you would receive, invested at a realistic return, against the property's cash flow plus principal paydown plus expected appreciation — after vacancy, maintenance, capital reserves and management. A property with strong cash flow can still be a weak return if a large amount of equity is sitting idle in it. Tax treatment, including the primary-residence exclusion, can change the answer entirely and should be confirmed with a tax professional.
What do I get from a reviewed valuation that an estimate does not give me?
The comparable sales we used and why, an adjustment for the condition of your specific property, a pricing range with the tradeoff at each point in it, a net-proceeds figure, the repairs worth making first, and a plain recommendation with its assumptions and what is still missing stated openly. Where we do not know something, we say so rather than filling the gap.
Keep going
The complete selling decision
Decision center
Should I sell this property, and for how much?
Pricing strategy, net proceeds, repairs before listing, and whether selling beats holding — answered in full.
Open the selling pillarHow this works
What Property Intelligence™ is
Every recommendation states its reasoning, its assumptions, what is missing, and how confident we are in it.
Read the methodValuation experience provided by RealScout.