At the risk of stating the obvious, I think that using the tools and resources found right here on Trulia is a good first step to obtaining information about a particular market or area of interest. Warm regards - Ted

County Assessor websites are the quickest and easiest way to find recent sales. You might be able to call some Assessor offices and they may give you some recent sales by phone, I've done it but they are busy people and may not have time.

Marlene,
Contact a good local Realtor and ask for a CMA if it's your home, you can also go to your county assessor's page and do a detailed residential search and report. It sounds hard but it is not. First do a search to bring up your property (usually you can put in your address and it will bring up the information) , print this information, you will need it for the detailed residential search.

In the detailed residential search page put in the following information:
1) date time frame - it should be no more than 12 months,
2) put in the type of home (ranch, split-level, 2-story etc),
3) put in a square foot range (I will add 10-15% to my properties size for the top number and do the same but subtract for the bottom number,
4) put in your area or property tax code,
5) put in the type of transaction - sold

These parameters will give you a number of homes that have sold in the last 12 months that are most like yours in the above items. Or if you are looking in a specific area to see what has sold in a certain time frame just put in that information. If you come up with a very large number of homes increase the number of items you are specifing like garage (2 car, 1 car, detatched or attached) basement ( full basement, finished or none) type of exterior( siding, wood lap) etc...

Marlene,

find a local top producing agent they can give you the latest information and if you employ them to ork for you they will be able to give you so much more. Buyers agency is free so it's a no brainer. Let them save you time and money.

MOst of the Reatlros in my area will be happy to give free comparable market analysis for a potential client.

The easiest and best way is to call a reputable Realtor in the area you are interest in; let them know the kind of iinformation you are interested to know; they will be able to give you the best answer.

Sylvia