How to Comp a Property Without MLS Access
You do not need a license to find a defensible ARV. You need the same selection rules agents use, applied to data you can get free.
The ARV is the anchor for every other number in your deal, and the standard advice is "get MLS comps." Fine if you have an agent on call; useless at 9pm when a seller is waiting on your offer. Here is the workflow that gets you inside a few percent of an MLS comp without a license.
The selection rules (these do the work)
A comp is only a comp if it matches on the dimensions buyers actually pay for:
- Sold, not listed. Asking prices are opinions. Closed sales are facts. Use active listings only to sense the ceiling.
- Within about half a mile, and never across a highway, school boundary, or obvious neighborhood line. Two streets can be two different markets.
- Within 20 percent on square footage, same bedroom count if possible.
- Sold in the last 6 months, 12 at the outside. A 2024 sale is not evidence of 2026 value.
- Renovated condition. You are pricing the house AFTER your buyer fixes it, so comp against the fixed up sales, not the distressed ones.
Three to five sales that pass all five tests beat twenty that pass three.
Where to find sold data free
- Zillow and Redfin sold filters: the workhorses. Sale prices come from public deed records in most states and are reliable there.
- County assessor and recorder sites: the primary source the portals scrape. Slower, authoritative.
- Non disclosure states are the exception: in Texas, Utah, and about ten others, sale prices are not public record, portals show estimates instead of facts, and the workflow changes. We wrote a separate guide for those states.
Adjusting between comp and subject
No comp matches perfectly. Rough adjustment values that hold across most workforce housing markets: about $50 to $100 per square foot of size difference (use the low end, marginal square footage is worth less than average), $5,000 to $10,000 for a bedroom, $5,000 to $7,500 for a bathroom, $10,000 to $15,000 for a garage, and pull ins for busy roads or power lines. If a comp needs more than three big adjustments, it was not a comp.
The traps
- Zestimate as ARV: automated estimates blend distressed and renovated sales; your ARV is specifically the renovated number. Use estimates as a sanity band, not the answer (except in non disclosure states, where they are often the best data that exists and you adjust accordingly).
- Tax assessed value: not market value, sometimes off by half. Ignore it.
- The one high outlier: if four comps say $180k and one says $215k, the $215k sale had something yours does not. Wanting it to be the comp does not make it one.
This whole selection and adjustment pipeline is what WholesalerPro runs automatically: it filters solds by distance, size, recency, and arms length status, maps them next to the subject, and derives the ARV with the offer math attached. Twenty seconds instead of an evening, and you can still inspect every comp it picked.
Frequently asked questions
Can I get accurate comps without being a real estate agent?
Yes, in most states. Sale prices are public record and flow into Zillow and Redfin's sold filters. Apply the same selection rules agents use (sold within 6 months, within half a mile, within 20 percent on size, renovated condition, same neighborhood) and your ARV will typically land within a few percent of an MLS based number.
Is the Zestimate accurate enough for the ARV?
Not as the ARV itself in normal states, because automated estimates blend distressed and renovated sales while ARV is specifically the renovated value. It is useful as a sanity band. The exception is non disclosure states, where actual sale prices are not public and a current estimate is often the strongest available anchor.
Type any address into WholesalerPro and get the ARV, a photo based rehab estimate, sold comps on a map, and a ready to send cash offer in about 20 seconds.