Tag: Realist

What Listing Agents Don’t Understand About Legal Descriptions

Every piece of real estate has both a mailing address and a legal description. The latter needs to be cited in MLS listings and on the deeds recorded with each County Clerk & Recorder.

Most listing agents copy the full legal description which they find on Realist, the property records section of the MLS. However, in the case of property located in a subdivision, that information contains way more than the legal description. Here is an example of a Golden home’s legal description as shown on Realist:

SECTION 28 TOWNSHIP 03 RANGE 70 QTR SW SUBDIVISION CD 108795 SUBDIVISION NAME CANYON POINT VILLAS FLG NO 2 BLOCK LOT 0001 SIZE: 1379 TRACT VALUE: .032

Because this property is in a subdivision which is itself recorded with the County, the true legal description is simply the name of the subdivision plus the block and lot number. In the above example, there is no block number, so the legal description is simply the following:

CANYON POINT VILLAS FLG NO 2, LOT 1.  That’s all that would appear on the deed recorded by the Jefferson County Clerk & Recorder.

Look to Us, Not Zillow, for an Accurate Valuation of Your Home

It’s common for people to put stock in Zillow’s “Zestimates” of their home’s value, but any Realtor can provide a much more accurate estimate of your home’s value. Realtors have access to my favorite valuation tool, the Realtor Property Resource or RPR, as well as to the MLS’s Realist tool, which non-Realtors can access. (Not all agents are Realtors.) Also, we can use the MLS to create a spreadsheet of all the comparable homes which have been on the market in your subdivision or area. Here’s an example: