How do I find the value of an unoccupied home?

The important detail is one you mentioned in passing: the house has been empty for six years. That changes both what it is worth and how you have to go about finding out, and I want to focus there rather than repeat the general advice above. Start with the honest framing. A vacant house is not the same asset as an occupied one, even if nothing visibly broke. Six years of no heat cycling, no water running through the traps, no one noticing a slow drip or a squirrel in the soffit. Buyers know this and they price it in. Appraisers do too. Appraisers assign a condition rating from C1 to C6, and a long-vacant house with accumulated deferred maintenance tends to land toward the low end of that scale regardless of how well it was built. So here is the sequence I would use. First, before you order any valuation, get the utilities turned back on. Water, gas, electric. This matters more than it sounds. A home inspector cannot test a furnace that is not fueled, cannot check for leaks in a system with no water pressure, and cannot evaluate an electrical panel with no power. Neither can an appraiser form a complete opinion. If a buyer's inspector shows up to a dead house, everything untested becomes an unknown, and unknowns get priced as worst case. Turning the utilities on for a few weeks is one of the highest-return few hundred dollars you can spend here. Second, find out what actually happened to the house while it sat. In the order that matters: - Water. Look for staining on ceilings, warped floors, musty smell, anything at the foundation. Six winters in western Pennsylvania is a lot of freeze-thaw cycles, and a burst pipe in an unheated house is the single most common and most expensive vacancy failure. - Roof and gutters. Clogged gutters over six years cause more damage than most people expect. - Pests and rodents. Look in the attic and the crawl space specifically. - Mold, which follows from the water issue. - Systems. Furnace, water heater, electrical panel. A six-year-old idle furnace is often fine and sometimes is not. Third, get a pre-listing inspection. Normally I call this optional. On a long-vacant house I think it is essential, for two reasons. It tells you what you are actually selling, so you can price honestly instead of discovering a problem at day twelve of escrow. And Pennsylvania requires you to complete a seller's property disclosure statement, which asks you what you know about the condition of the house. After six years away, you genuinely may not know. The inspection is how you find out so you can answer accurately, which protects you. Fourth, and only now, get the valuation. Ask two local agents for a comparative market analysis and be explicit that the house has been vacant six years. A good one will give you two numbers: value in average condition for the neighborhood, and value in the condition it is actually in. The gap between those is your decision point. If the gap is smaller than the cost to close it, sell as-is. If it is larger, do targeted work. One practical matter to handle right away, independent of value: your insurance. Standard homeowners policies typically restrict or exclude coverage once a property has been vacant beyond a set period, often 30 to 60 days. If you have been carrying a normal policy on an empty house for six years, there is a real chance you have been paying premiums for coverage that would not respond to a claim. Call your carrier and ask specifically about a vacant home or unoccupied dwelling policy. Do this this week, before anything else on this list. Also worth checking: property taxes current, no municipal liens or code violations filed against the property, and whether the borough has any ordinance about maintenance of vacant structures. Those surface during title work anyway, and it is much better to find them now. An honest note. You posted this in 2021, which means if the house is still sitting, it has now been vacant closer to a decade. Everything above applies with more force, and the gap between as-is value and restored value has almost certainly widened. Please do not work from any number you were given back then. I am a real estate professional, not an attorney, an inspector or an insurance agent, and I am licensed in California rather than Pennsylvania. I am Zoltan Peresztegi and I work in Los Angeles and the South Bay, including the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Allegheny County is outside my market. Message me and I will connect you with a strong local agent up there at no cost to you. Call your insurance carrier today and turn the utilities back on. Do those two things before you ask anyone what the house is worth. Zoltan

I would suggest speaking with a local real estate agent, they will be able to get you started in the right direction. Keith Jean-Pierre Managing Principal The Dapper Agents Real Estate Operations in ALL 50 States

Hi Jacquelyn, the best way to find the market value of a home in by connecting with a local Realtor. If you would like assistance finding an expert I can be reached at [email protected]

Contacting a local real estate agent to take a look and give you market value for sure.

Contact an agent in your are to help you with a Comparative Market Analysis. That will help you understand the range the property is in. The real estate agent will guide you on what pricing strategy makes sense and if there are any ways to maximize the value of your home. Hope this helps. If you need some contacts I would be happy to het those for you. 518-526-4964

I would definitely reach out to a local agent. Do your homework to find someone that really knows the community your home is located in. See if they can meet you at the home so they can actually see the overall condition of the house since you have not lived in it for 6 years. It is a good time to sell even if you want to sell "as is" but be strategic in your pricing. If it needs a lot of love the agent might have investors that will be interested, Good luck!

Feel free to give the MacIntyre and Cowen Team a call at (517)999-2675. We would be more than happy to help.

Contact a local Real Estate agent and ask if they would do a CMA for you. Most would do it for you at no charge in hopes of earning your business. They can also give you helpful hints on what you could do to raise the value.