What is my home worth: how a serious valuation is done
It is the first question anyone thinking of selling asks, and the easiest one to answer badly. Here is how you build a number that holds up in front of a buyer, a bank and a valuer.
Start from prices paid, not prices asked
The price written on a portal is a wish, not a fact. Between the published price and the one in the deed there is almost always a gap, and in an area with few transactions that gap can be wide. A serious valuation starts from sales actually completed on comparable properties in the same area, not from adverts.
It is also why the valuation is done by somebody who works locally. A national algorithm knows the square metres and the postcode; it does not know that the block has central oil heating, that the street is noisy at certain hours, or that the neighbouring quarter comes to market three times a year.
Floor area: commercial and net
Two different numbers, often confused, with large consequences. Net area is what you can walk on. Commercial area adds the walls and a share of the appurtenances — balconies, terraces, cellar, garage — at customary percentages. The price per square metre of comparables almost always refers to commercial area.
Comparing your net area with a commercial price per square metre is the quickest way to a wrong valuation, and it happens constantly.
What actually moves the price
Floor and lift. Aspect and hours of sun, which count for more in a narrow valley than elsewhere. Condition and the year of the last works. Energy class and type of system. Appurtenances: a garage in central Bolzano is not an accessory. Noise, view, outlook. Service charges and approved works.
And then the legal position, which weighs heavily here: the residents' restriction, third-party rights on sheet C, building irregularities to regularise. These are the items an algorithm cannot see and an informed buyer will find anyway.
Why overpricing costs more than underpricing
A property gets one moment of maximum attention: the first two or three weeks after publication, when the people who have been searching for months see it. If the price is off the market, that moment is burned, and what remains afterwards is the curious. Every later cut says something is wrong, and the negotiation starts at a disadvantage.
This is not an argument for selling fast and cheap — it is the opposite. A right price holds its ground in negotiation, because it can be defended with figures.
In short
- Comparables: prices paid, not prices asked
- Check which floor area the comparison uses: commercial or net
- Adjust for floor, aspect, condition, energy class, appurtenances
- Read sheet C before setting the price
- The first weeks are the only moment of full attention
The questions we are asked most
Do online valuations work?
They give an order of magnitude where the market is deep and homogeneous. In South Tyrol it often is not: few transactions per area, sharp differences between one side of a village and the other, and a residents' restriction the algorithm knows nothing about. Use them as a starting point, never as a price.
Is an agency valuation binding?
No. Ours is free, written and without obligation: it creates no mandate, does not commit you to sell, and stays yours even if you decide to do nothing. Its purpose is to let you decide with figures in front of you.
Is it worth renovating before selling?
Almost never wholesale, often in part. The works that pay back are the ones that remove a doubt: an irregularity regularised, a system brought up to standard, a measure that moves the energy class. Renovations of taste rarely pay, because buyers want to choose for themselves.
Official sources
Note
This guide is general information written by an estate agency. It does not replace advice from a notary, an accountant or the surveyor handling the property. The rules cited are those in force at the date of publication.
Read next
What selling costs: the expenses that fall to the seller
The good news is that the heaviest part — registration tax and the notary's fee for the deed — falls to the buyer. But there is still a list of items worth knowing beforehand, not after.
The residents' restriction: what it means if you want to sell
It is the rule that most surprises people from outside the province, and the reason two identical flats in the same building are worth different amounts. Worth knowing which side yours is on.
Seven mistakes that cost a sale money
None of these mistakes is dramatic on its own. Together they explain almost every sale that drags on for a year and closes below the property's real value.
Would you like to know what your property is worth?
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