Amalia Otet 
In real estate, evaluating local market conditions is a must before committing to any kind of deal. One of the easiest and most efficient ways to determine how much a property is worth is by running a comparables search. And we’ll show you how.
Search for recently sold homes in the same area as your target property
Let’s say you found an interesting investment opportunity in Los Angeles‘ Hollywood, a neighborhood chock full of history, glitzy homes, and great entertainment options.
First thing you need to do is go to PropertyShark’s Comparables section and type in the address of the property you’re interested in – a condo unit at 850 North Hudson Avenue #302 in our case. By default, PropertyShark will show you sales that have occurred within the last 6 months, within a half mile radius of the property.
And you can easily customize your search by selecting your own comparable criteria.
View local market statistics
The search will return a series of relevant market stats with key indicators of the status of the real estate market in that specific area, such as median price, median price per square foot, median gross square feet, lowest price, highest price, and more.
Optimize your search: add properties or exclude the ones you don’t find relevant
Keep in mind that even properties on the same street can vary a great deal. To get as close as possible to the real market value of your target property when running your comps search, you’ll need to consider relevant factors and home features such as:
- Property type
- Location
- Square footage
- Number of bedrooms and bathrooms
- Year built
For an even more accurate assessment of a home’s worth, you can exclude some of the search results. We, for example, wanted to see prices for two-bedroom condo units (such as our selected unit) so we eliminated all the one- and three-bedroom units from our comparables list, as shown below.
Now we have several relevant sale prices that can be used as a rough estimate of the property’s market value. Nevertheless, keep in mind that every property is unique and equipped with amenities that can render it more or less desirable.
To check availability in your area, click here. For more information on how to determine a property’s market value and to see a step-by-step guide on how to use our Comps tool, please go to our Help page.
Ready to start your own comps search with PropertyShark? Let us know how it goes!
