<p>keylyme - use the “fire sale” value, as Kalman Chany suggests,and subtract realtor commission. People tend to put <em>thousands</em> of dollars into their house before putting it on the market, wihch makes the market prices inflated.</p>
<p>We’ve gotten pretty behind on home maintenance. I know that in order to put our house on the market we would need to put on a new roof, sod the lawn (looks like crap, worn away in many places), take out a dead tree, do some landscaping, fix the leaky shower in the master bathroom, rip out the yucky carpet and put tile in the master bath, paint everything except the 2 rooms we did a few years ago, recarpet all bedrooms, LR, DR and study, paint the exterior (house is mostly brick, but the areas of wood need new paint), recondition the kitchen cabinets, and replace the garage door and the front entry door. This takes thousands and thousands off the “market value” that neighborhood comparables would indicate, but it seems perfectly reasonable to subtract out what these repairs/upgrades would cost.</p>