house values going up. be prepared

[catmother]

i just had my homeowner's insurance adjusted for the increased value of my home. it's costing over $200.00 a year more and the company is working on a general increase in rates.:yoiks:

[ScreamingMeemie]

1. Shop around for decent insurance. This real estate appraiser also

says, get an appraisal with current closed sales in your area. This is a line of bunk that many insurance companies use. We switch companies when they raise rates. Currently we are with Grange and have been for 5 years with no major increases.

[catmother]

2. unfortunately we got the new appraisal from the tax assessor

and it's in line with the new coverage. it's state farm -- good company -- we have our auto insurance with them too and get discounts for multiple policies.:cry:

[ScreamingMeemie]

4. I used to work for State Farm and would tell you differently. The odds

are the assessor used a model. They don't appraise the home itself. I would get another carrier and a true appraisal. Assessor's don't appraiser individual values. This is what I do for a living and I also work for an assessor off and on.

[Blue Diadem]

8. That's who we use too.

I've used Grange for gosh..30 yrs for homeowners insurance and for 34 yrs with auto insurance. Never had a problem with them at all and their rates are very reasonable.

[villager]

3. where are you?

housing prices aren't going up everywhere... and this can't go on indefinitely...

[ObaMania]

5. I'm in Northern Virginia and my house value..

.. went up apprx. 120K.

'Course I do live in the #7 most thriving county in the US.

[pitohui]

19. your values will continue to rise

as will the values of the homeowner in phoenix in my humble opinion, which is prob. worth what you paid for it

[catmother]

27. see my last post. we paid $48,000 for the 2-1/2 acres in 1996 and

had the house built for about $300,000 in 2002. it's worth way more than we paid. they tell me a million right now. :dilemma:

thing is even if we sold it and made a big profit it would cost us just as much to buy property and build again and the location may not be as nice at least -- not here in phoenix. and custom building is a bitch -- one subcontractor gets delayed and it throws everything off.

[Horse with no Name]

34. The first house we built when I was a kid

was in the middle of nowhere. We were the 2nd house built in the middle of a desert off of a dirt road in the early 70's.
That street is now called Yorkshire Drive. We had 2 acres.
Wish my folks had hung on to it.

[pitohui]

35. agreed you have to live somewhere

you may as well live where you are and enjoy any continued increase in value, when you retire, if you like, you can sell and move to a cheaper location, but assuming you have ties in phoenix you would just have to turn around and buy another property that might eat up all of your gain

i don't think any "bubble" will be popping in phoenix, there may be times of slower growth but the general trend of that area is up

that is just my amateur opinion but i don't think you need panic and sell now, i really don't see it

[catmother]

39. we're not planning on selling. and if we were to leave phoenix

which is doubtful we would be thinking of leaving the country. i hear one can live quite well on american money in costa rica.

[catmother]

7. phoenix, arizona. my house has almost doubled in value.

[Horse with no Name]

26. My mother's house has too

in the last year.

A patio home she could have purchased two years ago for $90k is now selling for $200k.
The home she lives in she paid $130k for, and it is now close to $250k.

Unreal.

[catmother]

28. is she in phoenix? when we moved here we could have bought

a new house -- maybe 1600 sq. ft. for $69,000. my hairdresser just bought a house built in the 60s. it's been remodeled -- 1600 sq. ft. $390,000.

[Horse with no Name]

33. Actually she is in Glendale

but in the Peoria school district which, from what I understand, is desirable.

[catmother]

40. yes. i've heard that.

[azmouse]

31. Just had my house appraised.

We paid $149,000 in '91... it appraised for almost $600,000 now. Just unbelieveable!

[catmother]

32. i see you're in glendale. our first house had a glendale address

but we were actually in phoenix. we bought in 1989 a new semi- custom 2400 sq. ft., half acre lot, pool, spa, tons of upgrades -- $164,000. it's probably going for $600,000 or more now.

:shrug:

now we're up north of carefree hwy.

[Dora]

41. My childhood home in Tempe...

My mother still lives there and did some remodeling to it after my stepfather passed away. 4 beds, 2 bath, and she's had people knock on her door asking if she was interested in selling. Not yet, she tells them. Houses in the 'hood have been selling between $300K-$450K. She tells me that if somebody offered her $500,000, she'd take it. Personally, I think that if she listed it she would get it, especially with the price of gas being what it is.

[catmother]

43. you're probably right. you know people used to move here

because of the weather and the good housing prices. now it's getting so high, i hope it slows down the growth. it's getting too crowded.

[stopbush]

6. Mine is going up $1400 p/y.

The last time the house was assessed was when the previous owner bought it in 2002.
We bought last August.

I swear, next move I'm going back to renting!

[catmother]

9. yes. i just checked where you live -- a very high area.

[EC]

10. Thats not your house value,

that's how much it would cost to build the same house now....

[catmother]

11. yes. the rebuild cost. so if my house burns down i want

enough money to rebuild it.

[ScreamingMeemie]

12. It's called replacement cost, unlike reproduction cost.

Replacement means that, instead of all brick, you may end up with brick front. Reproduction cost is what it would cost to reproduce an exact replica of your house minus depreciation...impossible to do.

[catmother]

13. so what do i do?

[ScreamingMeemie]

14. See above. You really need to get an appraiser out to appraiser, not

assess your house. Assessors use a model that may or may not be comparable to your home. I worked for State Farm for quite a few years and they are notorious for raising rates for any reason. They are quite high when it comes to homeowner's insurance. Good luck. With Grange, we haven't had a substantial increase in about 5 years.

[EC]

16. Yep, sorry, I work in insurance and have people

calling me all the time telling me the market value of their house is much lower than the dwelling amount on their policy...I have to explain to them that that reflects the cost of using the same materials to rebuild the same house in today's market.

[pitohui]

20. i wonder if i should switch to such a policy

my policy is what they think the market value of the house, i could never build a house this size with the cost of materials/labor what it is since 2003 and esp. post-katrina

i'm just afraid that if i try to change my policy now and they look at it too closely, they will find some way to get rid of me, i can't be their dream customer, they have lost a fortune on this poor battered house

[catmother]

15. we also got a very nice letter from our electric company telling

us that they have to raise our rates. i live in an all electric house -- the well is on electric and so is the septic.

my husband is concerned with paying off the mortgage. we have a lot of equity in the house and my payment is $729 a month. i tried to explain to him that we still would have to pay taxes and homeowners insurance. i handle all the money -- he just makes it. lol

[Ioo]

17. In BFE West Va, Mine went up $300 for the Year ($400,000 Home in WV?)

[catmother]

23. it's all very confusing. the house is approximately 2700 sq. ft.

custom built -- everything upgraded when we built it. it's on 2-1/2 acres on a hillside. i'm told it's worth 1 million. but assessed value is somewhere over $400,000 and then there's the insurance replacement cost -- he figured $125 sq. ft. replacement. i know i recently asked my builder what it would cost if i built today and that's he said about $450,000. it cost us about $300,000 to build in 2002. the property was bought in 1996 for $48,000. now an acre is going for $325.00. so basically the value is not just in the house but in the property.

:dilemma:

[pitohui]

18. well i tell myself it's a luxury problem

however my insurance didn't actually go up that much but they seem to not feel the value of my house has gone up as much as i feel it has, maybe they don't think so much of my new roof and floor etc. but i don't know why not, they paid for it :-)

fortunately my only claims, while large, have been natural disaster related and apparently they can't drop you unless you've had a NON natural disaster related claim in recent years, i don't file for that stupid stuff like theft and lost luggage they throw in with your coverage

otherwise i guess they'd drop the entire state! (louisiana)

[catmother]

21. i learned that lesson years ago. i put in claims for several

small things. they considered just filing a claim almost the same as paying one and they dropped me. had to go with some ridiculous amount with another company. then when i had 3 years claim free i was able to get in with state farm. even if they're a little higher, i feel their reputable -- didn't raise my car insurance when i totaled it (my fault).

[catmother]

25. good luck to you in louisiana. so you got hit with katrina?

[pitohui]

36. yes but i'm getting back to normal now knock on wood

i've had to rebuild this house twice in three years, on the bright side, there are no trees left to fall, and the neighborhood is looking nice, everybody has a new roof!

believe me, there are lots of places around here where work has not even really yet begun

[catmother]

42. so i guess you're planning to stay. my nail tech -- vietnamese

woman lived in new orleans and has family there. they own several businesses. they came to phoenix to stay with her for awhile after katrina, but they went back. said that "phoenix is too expensive".

[sendero]

22. Every insurance company I've ever used..

.... automatically inflates the "appraised value" of your house every year. If you don't double-check their work, you will wind up paying more than you should as their number has jack-all to do with the market value or rebuild price of your house.

Every 3 years or so, I make them dial it back.

Another thing to think about concerning homeowners insurance. The lot (chunk of land) your house sits on is a significant portion of its value. It could be as much as 35% or so or as little as 10%, depending on where you are.

But your insurance man wants to base your homeowner's premium on the total value of your house, including the land, even though if a tornado blew your house away the land would still be there.

[catmother]

24. see my last post. i'm told it's worth a million because of the

land, but the insurance company is not going by the value of the land, just the house.

[pitohui]

37. the value of the land is not included around here either

even if you had a total loss to flood or fire the land minus the cost of removing the debris would still be there

[maveric]

29. Prices have actually gone down in San Diego County.

The greed bubble is about to burst here. A study was done and only 11% of San Diegans can afford to buy a home here.
All these people who bought homes as an investment are sweating bullets.

[catmother]

30. i heard that about 6 months ago -- that houses were staying on

the market longer. i checked out buying a 2 bedroom condo in san diego just for the summer months. they were only about 1300 sq. ft., approx. $270,000 and a monthly fee of about $200.00 for maintenance. we quickly dismissed that idea. and that was not actually in san diego, but the outskirts like lemon grove.:yoiks:

[pitohui]

38. i suspect the death of san diego real estate market highly exaggerated

we prob. all had the same idea you did, catmother

place is way out of my range, that's for sure