Value attributed to pool

[Charles Witt]

In Florida you need a pool to keep the alligators off the lawn!

 

[Thomas Fiehler]

We sold our last house a couple years ago. It had an 18x36 inground pool that brought about an extra 10K in the market. Buyer pulled house up on the internet while at their house in France and she wanted a pool-she was glad it was a heated pool (until she gets the first utility bill to heat it!). Marketing time=2 days and it sold for full list.

 

[Wayne Tomlinson]

I live in central Illinois. We bought a house once with a 20 X 40 inground pool. The seller was a cousin of mine. She and her husband had put the pool in.

We bought after it had been on the market for seven years. We bought it on a contract with a very favorable interest rate and no down payment.

We worked on the house a lot, my adult kids and their friends and their friends enjoyed it a lot. We got the maintenance labor and chemicals etc.

Finally we put it on the market. About seven years later, we were able to move it. Whenever a couple came to look at the house, the pool was always a center of the discussion. One of the parents/prospects was just sure that if they bought this house, then their kids would drown.

We finally had a couple come whose son really wanted that pool. We moved only two houses away. Actually they hardly used the pool. It became very green with moss, and looked like a cess pool.

When they wanted to sell the house, if was anothrer extended time. [They had done a lot of other things to the house which turned people off, too.]

They finally sold it.

In my market, with any outdoor in ground or above ground pool, there is NO positive value to a swimming pool in this market.

One couple from California came to town an purchased a house with a pool similar to mine. When they divorced, I did an appraisal. The husband who had been in California for many years complained about my value of the pool. He had another appraisal done. It came in lower than mine.

I would like to see some one justify a positive value for a pool in central Illinois. Not just on one sale but on the market reaction.

It aint going to be positive.


Wayne Tomlinson

 

[Steve Owen]

It is hard to negate an above ground pool with a deck that is "cut" to match the pool or surrounds the pool. This makes the personal property harder to define.

It's not hard for me to negate it. A strong wind will still blow it down... then you'll have a nice looking curved deck. The deck may have some value. But, the house behind mine had a really nice above-ground with elaborate deck. Two years after installation, a high wind destroyed the pool. The owners then sold the house, new owners never put the pool back. Now, most of the deck is gone. Put yourself in the investors shoes. Do you want to make any part of a thirty year loan on that item?

Bottom line, the above ground pool is personal property. There's a reason Fannie's new forms require you to list any value given to personal property... because they don't want to loan on it.

 

[Mr Rex]

It's not hard for me to negate it. A strong wind will still blow it down... then you'll have a nice looking curved deck. The deck may have some value. But, the house behind mine had a really nice above-ground with elaborate deck. Two years after installation, a high wind destroyed the pool. The owners then sold the house, new owners never put the pool back. Now, most of the deck is gone. Put yourself in the investors shoes. Do you want to make any part of a thirty year loan on that item?

Bottom line, the above ground pool is personal property. There's a reason Fannie's new forms require you to list any value given to personal property... because they don't want to loan on it.

Where's that?

 

[Lee Lansford]

A loan officer just contacted me and asked "why do appraisers typically avoid giving value to a pool at a home."

Anyone who cares to share why they would or wouldn't attribute value to a swimming pool can post below.

Might it be because the market--in certain locations--does not indicate any increment to the MV of the property when an inground swimming pool is present?

 

[Steve Owen]

Read the reconciliation statement (which is in bold) at the bottom of page 2.

 

[Mr Rex]

Still not seeing any reference to detailing cost of personal property. Doesn't matter to me, I don't include personal property in the value, just trying to figure where I'm missing something that you see in bold.

 

[Michigan CG]

Don't see it either.

 

[Mr Rex]

Back to the pool question, I think it would be interesting to graph home sales with inground pools over the entire 12 month period. I would guess that they do better between May and September, especially as you move north, across the country. Things that I wonder about sometimes.