Beware of Online Inaccuracies in Your Charlotte Real Estate Inquiry
As the old adage goes, ‘time is money’ and that applies buyers and sellers in the computer age in which we live. Everyone relies on the Internet for information and it’s unfortunate that some online Charlotte real estate information can be misleading. For buyers, the vast amount of time one has to spend house hunting to find the home that you love, you don’t want or need to waste any of it on properties that aren’t what they seem.
Beware of the following inaccuracies when Charlotte house hunting online:
- History hiccups – Check with an agent to find out how long a house has truly been on the market. If a seller has switched agencies or removed the property from the market for a period of time, the house could appear to be newly listed based on its official number of days on market.
- Misleading descriptions – When you visit a property, double-check that which attracted you to it online is portrayed accurately. Ensure that a “fully finished basement” isn’t just concrete floors and drywall or that the “spacious backyard” isn’t as narrow as a dog run.
- Errors – It’s impossible for nationwide real estate websites to manage and fact check all of the information posted to their pages, so inaccuracies often happen — such as wrong price points or incorrect home descriptions. Follow up with a Charlotte real estate agent, if you’re seriously interested.
- Out-of-date information – Agents market many homes at once, and while they might reprint fliers for an open house or relay current information to inquiring buyers, they could completely forget to update the online information.
- Old listings – Be careful about spending time on a wild goose chase. Properties that have already sold are often still listed online. While this may be an intentional ploy to get you to call an agency, most agents are just too busy and forget. As well, some agents and national aggregating sites don’t update their listings as often as updates are available. Your search on www.iCharlotteRealEstate.com is updated hourly, if not every 15 minutes. You have up-to-date listings available there to you so as not to waste your time.
The Internet has made searching for homes and gathering house-hunting information much easier. Just be skeptical, see a home in person, and thoroughly research the history and neighborhood before making an offer on Charlotte real estate.
If you’re interested in purchasing a home, let me do the time-consuming house hunting for you. Call me at (704) 491-3310 today or email me at Broker@TheCharlotteScoop.com for more information.
(THE best Charlotte home search available - no kidding!)
Debe Maxwell, CRS/Realtor®/Broker
Broker@TheCharlotteScoop.com
Phone (704) 491-3310
Debe - These are great things to watch for when doing online searches for houses. While checking for errors - you might find some things that will fit in Gwen Banta's weekly listing of failed listing lines.
Debe: Great list of things to watch out for in every market.
Debe, your points are so well taken and many of my out of state buyers send me emails about homes that are no longer for sale or totally inaccurate...or realtors who do not represent a property correctly at all....it becomes a real challenge and the out of state buyer,especially, needs to trust the realtor they are working with!
Debe, great points. I see this everyday in real estate. Very sad and very costly!
Debe, Just more reasons why buyers should hire Realtors, save time, money and headaches and are people persons, my computer is not always that friendly.
Enjoy the day
These are really good points, Debe. People tend to believe everything they see on line--and it can cost them money.