Lowering my own house’s value

Zillow is a neat idea — personally I’ve found their values a bit flaky, but it’s still a worthwhile concept.

I just plugged in my own address; on a whim, I wanted to see if my house has accumulated any value since I bought it. Low and behold — it has! According to Zillow, the price has gone up almost 10% since I bought it! Admittedly, Zillow’s estimated value is still lower than what I paid for the house, but now…

I just checked the most recent sales data for the house — aka, when I bought it.

I pulled down my own house’s value. The way the sale was written up for the seller, there were actually two separate deals. Half of what I paid went to the woman, half went to the estate of the husband. Which means there were two simultaneous sale contracts, each half of what I actually paid for the house. Guess what! That lowers the value of the house, as it’s now considered to have sold at that 50% mark. DOH!