How home value comps work (and why old sales still count)
"Comps" decide what a home is worth more than any listing price. Here's how to read them — and why a sale from years ago can still be useful.
What makes a good comp
Recency, proximity, and similarity (size, beds/baths, era, condition). A sale next door last month beats a fancier model a mile away last year. But good comps are scarce on unique or older homes — so you have to stretch carefully.
Why old sales still matter — if you adjust them
A neighbor's sale from 2016 is stale on its face, but it's perfectly spatially relevant. The fix is a time adjustment: project that old price forward with a house-price index so it reflects today's market. A 2016 sale at $310k in an area up 45% since is really telling you ~$450k today.
How we do it
Expresstimates time-adjusts every comparable sale with the FHFA House Price Index and weights it by how near and how recent it is — so a great-location, older sale informs your number instead of being thrown out. It's directional, not an appraisal, but it's honest about its sources.