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Appraiser Tom Horn: Birmingham Prices Down, But May Be Recovering

If Sellers sometimes have an unrealistic idea of what a Buyer is willing to pay, Tom Horn brings them back to reality.

Tom is an appraiser in the Birmingham and Shelby Co. area, and owns appraisal-source.com, a company Lenders and homeowners trying to sell on their own rely upon for accurate residential market appraisals.

Colleen and I caught up with Tom and got his analysis of what’s happening with home values in the Shelby Co. and Birmingham areas. We found out pretty quickly that talking with Tom is very interesting!

From everything we learned about home price trends in the area, as well as the negative effects on home sales prices caused by government-mandated changes in the way appraisers are selected, we knew we needed Tom to share his expertise with us.

Thomas Horn, Appraiser

We’ve divided our interview with Tom into two segments. Click the players just below to listen to Parts 1 and 2.

Tom Horn Interview Part 1:

  • Price trends overall from 2006 are down, but may be slowly recovering
  • New homes are competing heavily with owners trying to sell existing homes
  • Foreclosures are now “making” the market
  • Increasingly, Foreclosures are higher end properties
  • What banks are doing that hurts Sellers and the community

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    Tom Horn Interview Part 2:

  • How Sellers can try to keep their home’s value at its highest
  • How the Government’s plan to manage appraisals is causing complications and affecting values
  • How Appraisers are being paid less while Homeowners are being charged more
  • How to sell sooner, rather than later: The value of getting a pre-appraisal

    • Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

    …or, if you’d like to listen by downloading to your portable device:

    Click here to download Part 1 (10 Mb).

    Click here to download Part 2 (7 Mb).

    Links to Thomas Horn’s websites:

    Click for Appraisal-source website

    Click for Tom’s Appraisal Blog

    We hope you enjoy … and thanks, Tom, for the great information!

    David Black

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    This entry was posted on Sunday, March 7th, 2010 at 8:43 pm and is filed under Podcasts, Real Estate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

    2 Responses to “Appraiser Tom Horn: Birmingham Prices Down, But May Be Recovering”

    1. Tom Horn Says:
      March 8th, 2010 at 8:21 am

      David,

      Thanks for the opportunity to discuss current news in the real estate market. Look forward to speaking with you more in the future.

    2. David Black Says:
      March 8th, 2010 at 1:44 pm

      Tom,

      We really enjoyed having the chance to talk with you. I think that, for Buyers, Sellers and other Agents, as well, your information is quite helpful.
      Colleen and I found talking with you to be very enlightening, and I think others who listen to the interviews will agree.

      Let’s do this again soon.

      Thanks again.

      David Black

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