Age Of A House

[Justin Cooper]

Hello, hopefully this is the right forum to ask this seemingly stupid question. How can you tell the age of the house if there are not public records that show the information? There has been much remodeling so the windows will not work. Is there anywhere else I can find the information? Thank you.

 

[Verne Hebert]

Lift the lid off of the toilet and look and the manufactured date embedded in the lid.

 

[Randy Beigh]

Justin,

Welcome to the forum.

Are you an appraiser? I ask because an appraiser should know the answer.

Looking at the toilet lid can be useful, although unreliable, but there are generally public sources. Check your county assessor office as they are the primary public source. Other possibilities are building departments, MLS reports, homeowners, or blueprints.

 

[Mountain Man]

How can you tell the age of the house if there are not public records that show the information?

Not uncommon in rural GA. Like was said, the toilet lid. The electric panel box is another place where you might get a general idea. But if it's 100 years old and has been updated...

 

[CANative]

It's almost always guess work or MLS or what the owner thinks it might be or just my guess based on the design, finish, style, windows, trim, door hardware, etc., etc.

There is almost no data for building records of houses much older than 30 years or so in my counties.

 

[TC]

Electric box, toilet lid, survey, county records, deed, ASK the owner or neighbor. Only about a million ways to find out.

And there is no such thing as a stupid question if you truly don't know the answer.


TC

 

[Richard Carlsen]

Justin

Welcome to the forum.

After you have been at it a while, you will notice things about a house that were done in a certain time period in your area. On ranch style houses in the late 50's and early 60's they use narrow high windows in the bedrooms for instance.

The is a very important technical word that is used in appraisal work that helps a great deal. That word is "est" meaning estimated. If you have no other means of determining the age of a house, you guess and then put 'est" after it such as "35 est".

Most of use do not adjust for chronological age but adjust on the basis of Effective age. This is something you have to work out yourself. For instance, in my case, I put the effective age in the condition line since to me, the condition is directly related to the effective age of the house. The adjustment is made there with no adjustment in the age line.

 

[Randy Beigh]

Oops, sorry Justin.

Looks like you are an appraisal.

"hopefully this is the right forum to ask this" is what made me think you were not an appraiser. Made me think the question would get moved the "Ask an Appraiser" forum.

 

[The Warrior Monk]

There's plenty of clues in the construction of the home that can give you an idea of the age of a home. Construction and material types vary from region to region, so you have to know you're area in order to make a good estimate.

 

[Kate]

Wow. I have not run into that problem before.

What about the foundation?? Around here we go from granite and field stone foundations to concrete block foundations to the current poured concrete foundations.

If there is a basement then you can find many clues in the size and type of framing.

If I ran into this situation I guess I would take the most reliable source and make sure you disclose that the age could not be verified in public records.

Would this be an EA if you end up having to guess???