What Are Comps in Real Estate? Plus the Columns to Track
Updated Nov 15, 2026
Comps in real estate (short for "comparables") are recently sold homes near a property that are similar to it in size, age, layout and condition. Agents, appraisers, buyers and sellers use those sale prices to estimate what the property is worth today. A common rule of thumb is three to six closed sales from the last three to six months, within about a half mile to a mile.
Finding a few nearby sales is the easy part. Most pages on comps stop there. The harder part is recording the facts that explain why two similar homes sold for different prices, and that's where an estimate holds up or falls apart.
What does pulling comps mean?
Pulling comps means finding the recent sales that best match one property and putting their details side by side so you can compare prices. An agent pulls comps to suggest a list price. A buyer pulls them to decide on an offer. An appraiser pulls them to support a lender's valuation.
How are comps in real estate chosen?
Comps are chosen by closeness in four things: location, sale date, size and type of home. The exact limits differ by source, and the differences are worth knowing.
- Opendoor suggests 3 to 6 sales within a half-mile radius, closed in the past 3 to 6 months, and within roughly 10% to 15% of the home's square footage (Opendoor).
- Redfin starts with a 1-mile radius and widens it to as much as 5 miles in less dense areas. It also suggests homes built within five years of yours (Redfin).
- Fannie Mae, whose rules most mortgage appraisers follow, requires at least three closed comparables, says sales from the last 12 months should be used, and notes that the best comps "may not always be the most recent sales" (Fannie Mae Selling Guide).
That spread matters. A 10-month-old sale can be a fine comp for an appraiser in a slow rural market. In a city where prices moved last quarter, the same sale is out of date.
What goes in a real estate comps table?
A useful comps table has one row per sale and enough columns to explain price gaps between similar homes. Most quick comp lists stop at address, price, beds and baths. That gets you a rough number, but not one you can defend when a client pushes back. Here's a fuller set of columns and why each one earns its place:
| Column | Why it's there |
|---|---|
| street address | Lets you find the record again |
| distance and direction | Fannie Mae has appraisers state it as a straight line, like "1.75 miles NW." Direction matters when one side of a highway sells for more |
| sale status | Sold, pending or active. Only closed sales count as comps. Pending and active listings are context |
| closing date | Shows how stale the price is |
| sale price | The actual closing price, not the list price |
| seller concessions | A seller credit toward closing costs means the real price was lower |
| finished square feet | The main size measure |
| price per square foot | Sale price ÷ finished square feet, worked out by you |
| beds / baths | Buyers shop by these |
| year built | Age stands in for systems, layout and wear |
| lot size | Matters more in suburbs and rural areas |
| condition and updates | A new kitchen or roof can explain a big gap |
| days on market | Fast sales point to strong demand. Slow ones suggest the price was a stretch |
| location notes | Busy road, flood zone, view, school boundary |
| source and date checked | So you, or a client, can verify it later |
The last column is the one people skip. It's also the one that saves you when someone asks "where did this number come from?" A notes column earns its place too: Fannie Mae's comparable sales guidance tells appraisers to weigh outside factors such as a FEMA-designated flood zone.
How do you turn comps into a price?
You turn comps into a price by converting each sale to price per square foot, taking the middle value, and then adjusting for real differences between the homes. Here's an illustration with invented numbers, just to show the math.
Say you're pricing a 1,800-square-foot, 3-bed, 2-bath house. You find three closed sales nearby from the last four months:
- Comp A: 1,700 sq ft, sold for $323,000, or $190 per sq ft
- Comp B: 1,850 sq ft, sold for $370,000, or $200 per sq ft
- Comp C: 1,950 sq ft, sold for $380,250, or $195 per sq ft
The median is $195 per square foot, and $195 × 1,800 comes to $351,000. That's a starting point, not the answer. Now read the columns that explain the gaps. If Comp B had a remodeled kitchen and your house doesn't, its $200 is probably too high for you. If Comp A's seller paid a $10,000 credit at closing, its true price was closer to $313,000, or about $184 per square foot. With those two corrections, a fair number for your house likely sits a bit below $351,000.
Time is the other adjustment. In a market that's still rising, an older sale understates today's value. Fannie Mae's own market conditions example shows an appraiser adjusting a comp upward by 2% because it sold before prices finished rising.
What mistakes make comps misleading?
Most bad comp estimates come from using the wrong price or the wrong home:
- Using list prices instead of sold prices. An active listing shows what a seller hopes for. Fannie Mae treats current listings as supporting data only, not as comps.
- Ignoring concessions. A headline sale price can hide a seller credit.
- Crossing a boundary buyers care about. A school district line or a busy road can split one radius into two markets.
- Mixing property types. A condo isn't a comp for a single-family house, even next door.
- Assuming sale prices are public everywhere. In non-disclosure states such as Texas (HomeLight counts about a dozen), sale prices aren't in county records. You'll need an agent or MLS data, and public websites can be patchy.
Doing this in Autofill
Autofill builds a comps sheet from one sentence, like "comps for a 3-bed, 2-bath house near [your address], sold in the last six months." It proposes the columns (address, sale price, sale date, beds/baths, square feet), can find the sales themselves as rows, then researches each one on the web and fills in the cells. It works from today's date and dates the sources it uses, which matters because comps go stale fast. You can ask for more columns, like concessions or days on market, and download the finished sheet as CSV or Excel.
The paid research is what saves you the evening. Free listing sites show sales one at a time, and you still copy each one into a spreadsheet by hand. Autofill gathers the whole set into one sheet, and you can set it to refresh so new sales land on their own. That pays off if you pull comps for every new client or listing.
Where it stops: Autofill has no MLS access, and it isn't an appraisal. In non-disclosure states, the public web may not have reliable sale prices. Check every price against the county record or your MLS before it goes in front of a client. If you only need one rough number for one house, a listing site's "sold" filter may be all you need.
Questions
How many comps do you need?
At least three. Fannie Mae requires a minimum of three closed sales for an appraisal, and most agent guides suggest three to six so one odd sale doesn't swing the result.
Can pending or active listings be used as comps?
Not as true comps. Only closed sales count, because the final price isn't known until closing. Pending and active listings are still useful context about where the market is heading.
Is an online home value estimate the same as comps?
No. An online estimate is a model's guess. Comps are actual closed sales you can see, check and adjust for yourself.