Shoutout to the guy who showed me his cash out refi math was off by $40,000
He was looking at his home's market value from a Zestimate he saw six months ago, not a current appraisal. He had based his whole plan to pull out $120,000 on that old number. When the lender's appraiser came out, the value was lower, and his available equity dropped big time. How many people are making moves based on old or wrong home value info?
Used to believe those online estimates were close enough for rough plans. Seeing a real number come in that much lower would be a gut punch. It really shows the difference between a guess and a professional looking at your actual house. Makes you double check every number before you get too excited about anything.