I suspect that the value placed on my home by my insurance agent is way high. Is there some way I could confirm and/or refute his valuation?
I live in Buffalo, NY and my house is like 750 sf with no basement and they set the replacement cost at $110K.
I can’t make heads or tails of that zillow.com site.
Best reply by Klathorn:
If your home is in a larger area?
Zillow.com will give you a rough estimate. Actually I just had my house appraised and zillow vs the appraiser was off by less than 1%.
Good Luck.
Zillow?
Just put your adress and zipcode on the line next to go. hit go. it should find it.
Read the original question here
Is it possible my insurance agent over-valued my home?
The best way to keep your insurance agent honest is to shop around for a different valuation and premium.
The replacement cost is what they estimate it would cost to re-build the house should it be damaged. It has nothing to do with what zillow shows. If your home is badly damaged the insurance company would not be buying you a new one, but repairing your old one. They buy new, pay contractors, etc.
Even if their estimate is high that is a good thing. It is better to have a little too much insurance than not enough. If your house is under insured and something happens you would have to make up the difference if repairs were needed.
The value of your house has only a small effect on your home insurance premiums, so why worry about it?
Besides, replacement cost is not necessarily assessment value. $110k for 750 sq ft is actually on the low side in most places.
Replacement cost is how much they figure that it would cost to completely rebuild your house, including demolition of say a burned to the ground house.