What Are the Top Property Valuation Tools for Real Estate Investors?

With all the resources online and different real estate software available these days, it’s much easier to make informed decisions on the true value of a residential property. Thanks to the availability of these numerous and varied online, evaluations have become faster, more streamlined, and more accessible tools. Each tool, while offering something slightly different, offers the chance for real estate investors to really dig into the data in order to maximize their return on investment, and derisk. Listed below, in no particular order, are some of the best property valuation tools available for real estate professionals. They vary from highly analytical valuation tools aiding in on-market properties to the off-market trend forecasting of other properties and neighborhoods.

Zillow Zestimate

One of the most well-known tools is Zillow Zestimate. Its main focus is providing estimated market values based on publicly available data and user-submitted data points for each property. Zillow estimates market values for about 104 million homes and covers more homes than many platforms.
While it does have a user-friendly interface on the web and mobile, comparative data analysis, and adjusts for constantly changing market conditions, it is best used as a starting point for deeper property analysis. Deeper dives are sometimes required as this tool is heavily reliant on publicly available data, such as property tax records and past sales data, which means the nature and accuracy of the data can falter. Furthermore, Zillow does not offer insight into property-specific factors like renovations or additions to a residence that could impact its value. 

Redfin Estimate

Redfin Estimate takes it up a slight notch from Zillow with improved accuracy in their property estimates. Redfin Estimates has a lower median error rate than Zilliow— 2.1% for on-market properties versus 2.4%. So from a real estate investing point of view, you get a higher level of valuation accuracy, detailed reporting and trends, and a mobile app. 

If you are investing in a larger market, the value estimate and data accuracy found in Redfin Estimate can be much more useful because it uses a much more comprehensive data set..

Realtor.com

Realtor.com focuses heavily on market insights and provides investors and investor agents with a robust database full of useful information. Affiliated with the National Association of Realtors®, Realtor.com  includes both MLS data and public records so you can get a property’s full history. Because of this, the platform also maintains a high standard of accuracy for real estate professionals.

Realtor also offers detailed property valuation reports, side-by-side comparisons of similar properties, and data related to local market trends and changing conditions. 

CoreLogic’s RealQuest

If you are focused more on research and reporting then CoreLogic’s RealQuest is a good choice. This institutional-grade property analysis tool helps real estate professionals customize and tailor reporting for their property portfolios. RealQuest also can get specific, streamlining property valuation, and providing accurate and timely information and financial insights. Whatever type of property you’re investing in, you’ll be able to drill down to the nuts and bolts of the data.

RealQuest’s solution is advertised as a serious, financial modeling tool targeted to professional investors. The complexity of the platform and the information it provides does subtly exclude new or intermediate investors. 

Property Shark

When looking at property, off-market distressed or foreclosed properties can be readily available. Knowing the historical records of the property can be invaluable. That’s where Property Shark comes in. This tool focuses on digging into property reports,  property ownership records, zoning rules, tax assessments, county documents, property characteristics, voluntary and involuntary liens, demographics, neighborhood characteristics, and sales histories to deliver a comprehensive property report.

This rich history of property and related transactional records comes in handy with those foreclosed or distressed properties, as histories can often be muddied, missing, or in pieces all over the county. The more detailed a history you have on a property, the better you can determine its valuation.

HouseCanary

HouseCanary is a modern, tech-savvy tool that offers different ways to analyze and comb through data. It uses machine learning and data analytics to create property valuations that are as close to humanly accurate as possible. 

Some features include predictive analytics to forecast future property values, market trend analysis using numerous data sources, and investment analysis to pinpoint risks. You can never go wrong with more data.

Mashvisor

Mashvisor offers some benefits for a more local view focused on rental properties. It hones in on particular neighborhoods to highlight the best short-term rental properties available while providing detailed income and cash flow estimates. This type of analysis is especially helpful with rental properties because it’s often hard to tell what’s really going on.

Not that a single tool can wholly predict the future of a single-family rental property, but focusing more on a particular neighborhood rather than a larger city or municipality does help narrow things down, leading to smarter investments and reduced risk.

RPR (Realtors Property Resource)

RPR (Realtors Property Resource) comes directly from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). It requires an active NAR membership to maintain access and offers data pulled in real-time from the MLS. Tons of REALTORS use RPR as a go-to property analysis tool.

RPR is full of comprehensive property data and reports, market analysis tools, and includes a convenient mobile app. While focusing primarily on property valuation, RPR lacks the local resources that help create a robust and competitive property or market analysis. Because of this, this is a tool agents and agent-investors will often use in the accompaniment of other more informational tools. , The information in RPR is not holistic enough to be the end-all-be-all of real estate property valuation tools.

Privy.pro

All of these tools are well and good, but each one either offers something wholly unique from the others or is missing an integral part of your property valuation research. You could end up leveraging one or more of these tools, just to get the true story on a single property. Or you could use Privy, offering all the best features of each one of these tools, creating a one-stop shop for all of your real estate investing needs.

Some of the platforms above offer either off-market OR on-market data. Our platform boasts an extensive dataset, including direct MLS feeds, nationwide public record and mortgage data, and comprehensive rental comps and listings. This wealth of real-time information ensures that every stakeholder—from real estate agents and lenders to investors—can make informed, swift, confident decisions.

Privy.pro focuses on a data-driven approach covering all aspects of where and how you get your data. Whether it be local, MLS, market trends, future analysis, rental property variability, and so on, Privy has it all packed into a seamless and easy-to-use app. This helps investors at any level not only pick out undervalued properties and potential investments but also determine the most accurate valuation possible.

Some of the other tools above specialize in specific types of real estate investor technology. Ours encompasses many specialties and very advanced tools to support each type of investment strategy, including long-term rentals, short-term rentals, buy and hold, fix and flips, BRRRR, wholesaling, and many others.