Before placing a bid on your dream home, you'll want to make sure the price is realistic.
After all, you don't want to overpay. But you don't want to lose the house either. Here's
where the true power of the Internet is evident. With just a few clicks, consumers have
access to information that just a few years ago would only have been available through a realtor or a trip to the county clerk's office.
At iOwn.com, which is primarily a mortgage-brokering
service but also has home listings, select the option "Check Recent Sale Prices." By
entering the town and state where you're planning to live, you can get a list of the prices
of recent home sales in the vicinity. Maybe the Clinton's should have checked —
according to iOwn.com, the most expensive home sold in Chappaqua in the past year went for
$1.34 million, less than the cool $1.7 million the Clintons paid for their new pad. Other
sites offering similar services include Yahoo! Real
Estate and RealEstate.com.