Andi St. Jean

A farm/ranch listing is a piece of acrege property that is zoned/identified as farm and ranch. A farm/ranch property may or may not have a resisdential dwelling on it. Therefore, the listing you have found may actually be a farm/ranch property with a home on the property. There is also the chance that it is an acrege property with a home on it that is not zoned to be used as a farm or ranch. If you think there could be a mistake ask your Realtor to varify that the property is listed correctly or check with the county clerk's office. Realtors make mistakes when entering new listings onto the mls all the time so don't be afraid to ask for varification. - Sun Jul 27 2008, 14:18

The best way to know if a house is overpriced or priced right is to have your Realtor do a Comparitive Market Analysis (CMA) for you. A CMA will compare similar houses in the same neighborhood that have sold in the last 6 months. The best way to understand the comparison is to pay attention to the price sold per a square foot. This will give you a better understanding of the comparisons if the houses used vary in square footage. A good CMA should only use houses in the same section of a neighborhood, close to the same square footage (within 200 sq. ft.), same number of stories, same bedrooms and bathrooms (if possible), etc. You want to keep the comparison as similar as possible to the house you are comparing. A house that is priced higher by as little as $2-$3 per a sq. ft. than the average sold price per a sq. ft. can make a big difference in a sales price and will run the risk of not appraising for a loan. In our current market and lender situation, banks have really tightened appraisal requirements. If you need a referral for a qualified Realtor to help you with this please email me. andistjean@kw.com - Sun Jul 27 2008, 11:49