Can you Read a Real Estate Listing?

A real estate listing is the most important aspect of buying a home. If you've never bought a home before you might find yourself in a position where you are not super familiar with what they are or how you read them. Fortunately, reading a real estate listing is not that hard of a skill to learn.

For informational purposes only. Always consult with a licensed real estate professional before proceeding with any real estate transaction.

There Are Different Types of Listings

The most important thing to keep in mind is that there are several different kinds of listings. Just 15 or 20 years ago, all the listings were the same and they were in a home buying catalogue you could get for free at the grocery store. Today, there are tons of different kinds of listings just waiting for you on the Internet.

The Items You Should Pay Attention To

There are a few key items on a listing you should pay attention. If a listing does not have any of these items, you should move on to the next one.

• List Price: For obvious reasons, the price of the house being listed is one of the more important items to consider.
• Total Bedrooms (TB): Next, you need to know whether or not the home has enough bedrooms for your family. Finding this information on the listing should be easy.
• Size: The listing should also include the overall size of the home. This is important to check because you do not want to find yourself buying a tiny home with a lot of rooms. You also do not want to find yourself just as surprised by a huge home with just a couple rooms.

Examining Real Estate Listing Photos When Buying

The quality of the photos in a real estate listing can have a huge impact on how much attention the listing gets. In some cases, a clever photographer can disguise flaws and unlikeable features of a home, but these can always be revealed upon walking the property. In other cases, it might be possible to spot a great property that's simply the subject of poor or amateur photography. 

There are a few common tells that the problem might be the photography rather than the home itself. First, if the photos are grainy, blurry, or out of focus, whatever is displayed in the picture is probably a poor representation of reality. Underexposed and overexposed images (or, those that seem too dark or too bright) also show the home worse than it really is. Look for strange angles and poorly staged areas that may look terrible, but could be fantastic with two minutes of attention. Lastly, if you see odd or irrelevant closeups and subjects such as doorknobs, hallways, or other random features, chances are the photographer is doing the home a disservice. 

Work With a Real Estate Agent to Buy Your Next Home

The last thing you need to check as you are shopping for a home is how long the listing has been up and how long the house has been on the market. If the home is listed at a good price and it has been on the market for a while, there is probably something significantly wrong with it.

For informational purposes only. Always consult with a licensed real estate professional before proceeding with any real estate transaction.