Need help with a home problem.

[TheArtist]

I bought my first house a while back from McGraw Davisson and Stewart, and was told it was 2048 sq feet.  The realtors told me it was a fair price by showing me what the average sq. ft. per home goes for in the area then multiplied it by the # of square feet in my house, it came up right at the range.  My sister bought a 1600 sq ft home and when they came over I told them my square footage and they mentioned that it didnt seem to be that large?  I watch those home buying shows on hgtv and whenever they say a house is around 2000 sq feet it seemed so much larger than mine.  This evening I got out the old tape measure and my sq footage is just under 1500, but that doesnt include the garage.  Is the garage included in sq footage?  Or did I get duped and pay for 1/4th a house I didnt get?

[TUalum0982]

quote:Originally posted by TheArtist

I bought my first house a while back from McGraw Davisson and Stewart, and was told it was 2048 sq feet.  The realtors told me it was a fair price by showing me what the average sq. ft. per home goes for in the area then multiplied it by the # of square feet in my house, it came up right at the range.  My sister bought a 1600 sq ft home and when they came over I told them my square footage and they mentioned that it didnt seem to be that large?  I watch those home buying shows on hgtv and whenever they say a house is around 2000 sq feet it seemed so much larger than mine.  This evening I got out the old tape measure and my sq footage is just under 1500, but that doesnt include the garage.  Is the garage included in sq footage?  Or did I get duped and pay for 1/4th a house I didnt get?

Did you ever get an answer to this? I was always under the impression that the sq footage listed for a house was actual "liveable space".  My definition of liveable space doesnt includ the garage.  The house we are building is 2200 sq ft and that doesnt include the back patio or garage.  

[tulsa_fan]

When you had your appraisal done for the mortgage company they would have checked your sq footage.  Did you check that?  Also, you might have tons of closet space that you aren't counting.  Most of the time, I thought they measure around the outside of the house, less the garage for simplicity.

Curious to the answer as well.

[waterboy]

There are lots of different descriptions. Heated space is another one. In the past generally speaking, realtors only considered what was heated and conformed to normal sizes to be included. That means that garages, low ceiling basements, open breezeways etc. were not included. They also use the phrase, "as per courthouse records" as a defense to their oral remarks. So a realtor could say, "the last appraisal showed 2000 sq. feet" then disclose on the listing that it was 1600ft per courthouse and be safe. Bear in mind the appraisal may have been for a re-finance or equity loan where the bank's interest was still covered so they didn't care how accurate the measurements were. In fact, when I got an equity loan they simply asked me for an estimate.

When the market heated up in the late 90's, the rules started to be expanded. For instance a friend of mine was able to include his basement by simply opening a duct into it. It was still open ceiling, concrete walls and only suitable for storage and utilities but the bank bought it and they were able to add some $25,000 to the appraisal. Of course the banks wanted to loan as much as possible so they played the game. Real appraisers seem to be disappearing as more institutions rely on computerized court records that may or may not still be accurate. Also if someone adds on to their property without getting appropriate inspections they may be hesitant to challenge the court records.

Measuring yourself is the best advice. Then, if the measurement is different, you can make them answer why. Cheaper than a lawsuit after the fact.

edit: I was a realtor for several years. Buying a house is tantamount to buying a car on 11th street. Caveat emptor.

[TheArtist]

Apparently I got gyped as best I can figure. There is no way my house, the liveable space, including closets, is 2,000 sq feet. When I had my house refinanced and reappraised, after having had it for 2 years, they didnt measure they just took for granted that it was 2,048 sq feet.  I originally paid 114,000$ however it was appraised for 18,000$ more than I had paid, and it was still not even close to being finished remodeling at the time. Its not an expensive house to begin with, but it still would have been nice to either have actually had the space I paid for or not paid as much. Just checked Zillow.com and they have my house as now being worth 171,000$, go figure lol.

[Im calling you out]

I have a simple way to find out what the city sees as square footage for your home.  Go to the library (Tulsa Library) On the computer you have different programs other than the internet.  One is called land records.  Open that program hit A press enter then 41 then press enter.  On this new page you will enter your home address and it will show the owner name address number of rooms as well as sq. ft. and the lot size.  I hope this helps.

[TheArtist]

I just remeasured again. Was eeeextragenerous and added outside walls, rounded up every half foot to a full foot, etc. Came to 1700sq feet.

Then I thought perhaps they added the storage areas off the garage. One little rooom once had a window unit in it so figured perhaps they counted that. Its basically a laundry room and is 56sq feet. Then added the closet that contains the heating unit for the house it has space for storage and is right off the garage, it was 84 sq feet. Thats 130sq feet total for those two, so adding that makes the square footage 1830 sq feet. Thats about 200 sq feet short of what its supposed to be. Not a huge amount but for a house this small it would have been nice to have had or to have had that 16,000$ lol.

If I go and I find out the square footage is actually less than what I paid for, do I have any recourse? And in this instance, would it be worth bothering with?

[tulsa_fan]

The best remedy you could have at this point would be to argue your property taxable value is lower based on less sq footage.  As long as you don't intend to sell anytime soon, I'd have an appraiser come measure the sq footage, and then next time property values come out (pretty soon) you can argue that your taxable rate has been based on significantly more sq footages than your house actually has.  Might save you a couple hundred bucks on your property taxes.

I guess you could argue with your appraiser, it would have been their responsiblity to measure the property.  Of course, it's been a long time.  

I think sq footage is a moving target.  I really doubt what you see is ever accurate.  When we built our house, it ended up being 100 sq ft less than what the builder's plan said.  Most people would never notice this and just go by what the builder said. (and as such somewhere down the road someone might felt jilted if we'd only used the builder's numbers not noticing the discprepency)

Anyway, hope you are happy with your home, I could tell you the horid stories of mine if you want to feel better?  Mine is falling apart, literally, and it's just a tad over two years old, needless to say we have filed a lawsuit against our builder.  Really sad for us!  We loved the house.

[TUalum0982]

quote:Originally posted by tulsa_fan

The best remedy you could have at this point would be to argue your property taxable value is lower based on less sq footage.  As long as you don't intend to sell anytime soon, I'd have an appraiser come measure the sq footage, and then next time property values come out (pretty soon) you can argue that your taxable rate has been based on significantly more sq footages than your house actually has.  Might save you a couple hundred bucks on your property taxes.

I guess you could argue with your appraiser, it would have been their responsiblity to measure the property.  Of course, it's been a long time.  

I think sq footage is a moving target.  I really doubt what you see is ever accurate.  When we built our house, it ended up being 100 sq ft less than what the builder's plan said.  Most people would never notice this and just go by what the builder said. (and as such somewhere down the road someone might felt jilted if we'd only used the builder's numbers not noticing the discprepency)

Anyway, hope you are happy with your home, I could tell you the horid stories of mine if you want to feel better?  Mine is falling apart, literally, and it's just a tad over two years old, needless to say we have filed a lawsuit against our builder.  Really sad for us!  We loved the house.

care to disclose who your builder was? what neighborhood, etc??

As for you Artist, I would agree with the person who said your recourse should be the appraiser.  He obviously didnt do the job that you paid him to do.  I can understand 50-100 ft discrepancy possibly, but 500?? I would definitely talk to someone and get some advice about what you could do. False advertising?

[tulsa_fan]

Since you asked . . . Concept Builders.  They have been around for a long time and build mostly in Sand Springs.  I am hopeful they will do the right thing, but it stinks that we have had to take it this far.  Basically there is a water drainage issue under the house, subsurface.  They discovered it prior to pouring the foundation and rather than contact an engineer about it (or even us) they proceeded to build the house on it.  Even their own documentation refers to a "spring seeping from the back of the property"  they can't win this.  At the end of the day if they do right by us, all I'll really tell people is they are NOT a custom home builder, stick to their own developments and you may be OK.  We have 2 1/4 inch raise already in our house, again, just over two years old.  The house is fully piered, so the middle of the foundation is raising.  Cracks I've never actually seen before, there are some with 1/2 inch gaps.  

We live in Prattville, basically on the side of the hill, although our building pad was flat.

Hopefully we'll be out of here in a couple of months, we had two support beams collapse in the attic a couple of weeks ago, so I'm not sure how much longer the house is safe to live in.  Pretty sucky huh?  URGH!  Next house, existing home and we will use TWO engineers to do the inspections.  Being burned once is enough!

Sorry, you probably didn't want that novel, but as I'm sure you can imagine, that is the kind, businesslike version.  If they don't settle soon on a reasonable figure, I can assure you it will get ugly and I have a BIG mouth!

[Steve]

I think when most realtors and sellers quote square footage, they are referring to climate controlled floor space, or all areas that are heated/cooled, including the garage if it is climate controlled.  This would include baths, closets, etc.

When I bought my house years ago, the seller said "2,000 sq. ft."  The Tulsa county tax assessor lists my house as 1,920 sq. ft.  Whether or not someone gets gyped based on a square footage quote is relative; a house is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.  Lots of other factors influence selling price besides just size.

[Wilbur]

Have you looked for secret rooms?  A basement you don't know about? [}:)]

[TheArtist]

quote:Originally posted by Steve

I think when most realtors and sellers quote square footage, they are referring to climate controlled floor space, or all areas that are heated/cooled, including the garage if it is climate controlled.  This would include baths, closets, etc.

When I bought my house years ago, the seller said "2,000 sq. ft."  The Tulsa county tax assessor lists my house as 1,920 sq. ft.  Whether or not someone gets gyped based on a square footage quote is relative; a house is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it.  Lots of other factors influence selling price besides just size.

Thats true about other factors. But when other houses on the block, just like yours, are going for 30,000 less because their square footage is in the 1,600 square foot range and yours is said to be 2,000 square feet, but then turns out it isnt... Well you do the math.

If you were buying a house and trying to decide between house A and house B. House A was 1600 sq feet and sold for 100,000 and House B was 2000 sq feet and sold for 130,000 and you went ahead and bought house B thinking it was a fair price. Then you had friends come over and say stuff like,,, Hmmm, this doesnt seem like its 2,000sq ft to me. Then you measure it and it isnt. Sure, perhaps I should have caught that, but you often have a lot going on in your mind when your looking and trying to buy a house and would think that the square footage they are basing the price on is the right square footage. Is it structurally sound, ever have termites, whats that little crack in the foundation, hows the plumbing and electrical, will they go down on the price, what can I negotiate, whats my interest rate going to actually be, whats under this carpet, how could anyone live with that gawd awful wallpaper and how easily will it come off, etc. etc. I did like the house. But mine was said to cost more than the ones around it because it had more square feet. But it didnt. You dont just buy a house, you buy into a neighborhood as well and the prices of the similar houses around you do affect the price of your hose.

I could have gotten a smaller home in a nicer area or a larger home in a not as nice area. I figured I found a balance that was about right price/sq foot/location wise.

[TheArtist]

quote:Originally posted by Wilbur

Have you looked for secret rooms?  A basement you don't know about? [}:)]

No, but the "floored attic" consisted of a space you can barely crawl through and a couple of 2"x12" boards laid across the rafters lol. I did catch that little "exageration" when I was poking around the house but figured it wasnt a big deal.

[tulsa1603]

Are you measuring room by room, or are you measuring the perimter of the house.  The wall thicknesses are included in the square footage, also.  When the appraisors have done my property in the past, they basically measure outside all the way around, then subtract anything that wouldn't count (mechanical, garage).  Try it that way.