How does one know if equity is in a home? I was told by my bank that I need to pay a $300 appraisal fee to determine if I have enough equity in my home to get a HELOC...Is there a way around this????
you can go to the county appraisal district for your property county to determine tax value of ur property. Plug in the address and it pulls up numbers. Tax appraised value is less than market value usually but still would give you an idea.
Good luck
Tax appraised value and market value from my experience will always be different and in most cases, considerably, depending on your area.
If your trying to get a HELOC there no way around an appraisal.
When did you purchase the home?
What are homes selling for in your area that might be comparable to yours?
Drive around the neighborhood and look for any for sale. Then look them up to see what they might be selling for. This would be a pretty good indicator on your homes value.
If you do in fact have a some equity there to use for investment purposes, $300 is a small price to pay.
Perfecto,
Were you charged at all for the appraisal??
You say there were no closing costs at all? Could you PM me the lender you used?[ Edited by HouseBuyerGuy on Date 02/26/2004 ]
you can go to the county appraisal district for your property county to determine tax value of ur property. Plug in the address and it pulls up numbers. Tax appraised value is less than market value usually but still would give you an idea.
Good luck
It's unlikely that the HELOC lender is going to accept a county tax appraisal.
However, I just picked up a HELOC and they did an online appraisal in minutes and there was no charge. Nor were there any closing costs.
Shop around.
Tax appraised value and market value from my experience will always be different and in most cases, considerably, depending on your area.
If your trying to get a HELOC there no way around an appraisal.
When did you purchase the home?
What are homes selling for in your area that might be comparable to yours?
Drive around the neighborhood and look for any for sale. Then look them up to see what they might be selling for. This would be a pretty good indicator on your homes value.
If you do in fact have a some equity there to use for investment purposes, $300 is a small price to pay.
Perfecto,
Were you charged at all for the appraisal??
You say there were no closing costs at all? Could you PM me the lender you used?[ Edited by HouseBuyerGuy on Date 02/26/2004 ]
Learn the market yourself
have a realtor pull comps for you
call the assessors office.
Look them up online (homegains.com (or is it www.housegain.com...?), yahoo real estate, etc