Value websites miss the mark

from Daily Real Estate News 6-24-08. Home-Value Web Sites Miss the Mark: Online home-value sites are often wrong. The estimates will have huge errors in them. Zillow.com and Cyberhomes.com rely on computer-generated automated models to estimate values, and the models help compensate for the fact that many neighborhoods don’t have enough sales to generate accurate values based on experience. But these models don’t reflect home condition, improvements, and may not even accurately convey property descriptions. The data is best used as a way to form an overall impression of a neighborhood.