You’ve likely heard that the most important aspect of real estate is “location, location, location.” If that’s true, then the second most important consideration may be size or square footage.
At its most basic, square footage tells you the size of a property. It can also determine whether you’ll be able to squeeze a king-size bed plus your home office into the primary bedroom, or accommodate your beloved baby grand piano in the family room.
Square footage also plays a major role in how a home that is for sale is priced. Getting square footage wrong when you are buying or selling can be a big headache and an expensive mistake. For instance, you don’t want to pay too much for a home that’s smaller than you thought it was.
Here, you’ll learn more about how square footage is correctly calculated.
Key Points
• Accurate square footage measurement impacts home value, pricing, and property taxes.
• Measure each room’s length and width, calculate square footage, and sum for total gross living area.
• Include main living spaces; exclude garages, basements, outbuildings, and rooms below grade.
• Verify square footage by checking city records or hiring a professional appraiser.
• Consider condition, design, and location when buying a home, ensuring it fits your budget.
Why Measure Square Footage of a House?
Here are some reasons why you may need to know the square footage of a house:
• When selling a house, square footage plays a big role in determining the asking price. Real estate agents will look at comps in the neighborhood — houses of similar size and style — that have sold recently to help them gauge demand for this new listing and set a price.
Square footage isn’t the only factor in pricing a home. An agent will also look at things like condition and building materials when determining value.
• For those who are buying a home, square footage will play a big part in the price. It’s important that buyers verify that the listed square footage is correct so they know they are getting the space they’re paying for.
When you’re getting a mortgage, the lender will need to verify square footage as well, to make sure the house is worth the price the buyer and seller have settled on.
Lenders send an appraiser to do a home appraisal. This looks at the house to spot anything else that will adversely affect the value of the home, such as cracked walls, a leaky foundation, or a roof that needs repair.
If a lender’s appraiser finds discrepancies in square footage, there may be issues with a mortgage loan going through. Lenders may be unwilling to underwrite a loan for a house they think is overvalued for its size.
To save time, buyers should consider doing their due diligence and measure square footage before putting in an offer. Because the size of a house helps determine its value, it also influences property tax assessments.
• You may also need to know the square footage if you want to dispute a high tax assessment or apply for permits to add on to your house.
Homeowners who think their property is overvalued for tax purposes can dispute the assessment. Confirming square footage is a good place to start. If a home is actually smaller than the recorded size, that may put a homeowner in a favorable position to have their property taxes reduced.
There are a number of reasons the assessed size of your home could be off. Assessors may have used an estimate for their initial assessment, builders may have made a calculation error when they were filing for building permits, or a portion of the house in the initial plans may never have been finished.
If you think the square footage in the public record isn’t correct, contact your city’s assessment department and ask for a review. The city may ask you to file an appeal or a grievance.
Finally, if you’re planning on hiring someone to remodel your home or put on an addition, you may need to know your square footage in order to pull a building permit for the work you want to do.
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How to Measure Square Footage
There are no hard and fast rules about what parts of your house should be included in a square footage measurement.
The American National Standards Institute provides the generally accepted guidelines about how to calculate square footage, but there are no laws governing the issue, and standards may vary by region or even by listing agent. These discrepancies are another good reason to double-check square footage yourself.
That said, the gross living area is what most people mean when they discuss square footage. Here’s an easy way to calculate it yourself.
• First, get prepared to brush off your drawing skills, and bust out a pen and paper — preferably graph paper. Each square of the graph paper can represent one square foot.
• Next, moving one room at a time, measure the walls with a tape measure or laser measure, rounding to the nearest half-linear foot. As you measure each wall, draw it out on your paper and write the measurement next to the line.
• For regular rectangular rooms, you will be able to calculate the square footage by multiplying the length of the room by its width.
• If the room you are measuring is an irregular shape, break it down into small rectangles, triangles, or other shapes and measure those separately. Add up the square footage of these small areas to get the room total.
• Add on to your floor plan room by room, and don’t forget to include hallways and closet spaces that may be between rooms. Stairways are also usually counted in gross living area.
• Do this for every floor of the house, and once you have a complete floor plan, tally the square footage of all the rooms in the house to get total square footage. Round the result to the nearest square foot.
• If you have a two-story house, you may be tempted to simply measure the square footage of one floor and multiply that by two. The danger with this approach is that not every floor will have the same footage.
For example, if you have any double-height rooms, you can’t count that square footage as part of the second floor.
Note: ANSI guidelines measure square footage from the exterior of the house. This method does not subtract interior walls from the square footage, so it may not give a completely accurate sense of a home’s living space.
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What to Leave Out
Living space that is above the land line and has heating, lighting, and ventilation is included in the gross living area. Garage space does not make the cut. In general, neither do basements, even if they’re finished (although appraisers will include the space in their appraisal valuation).
A good rule of thumb is that anything that is built below grade, i.e. underground, does not count toward gross living area. Other buildings, including guesthouses and pool houses, that require you to go outside to them can’t be included in the gross living area either.
Finished attic space may be included in the gross living area as long as it has enough clearance — generally a ceiling of at least seven feet. Enclosed porches can be included if they are heated by the same unit that heats the rest of the house.
That said, it can be helpful to measure the square footage of these areas for your records, and they can be included separately in a sales listing
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Other Considerations Before Buying
If you’re in the market for a new home, the first thing you can do to verify square footage is take a look at the city’s building department records.
When homes or condominiums are built, plans submitted for a building permit include square footage.
Many of these records are available online and provide a way to check whether the listed square footage is at least in the ballpark of city records.
Note that if a house has unpermitted additions, they will not show up in official records.
In fact, add-ons built without going through the proper city channels can add uncertainty to the real estate process, and may not even be included in the gross living area advertised in a real estate listing. And appraisers may not include these additions in the value of the home.
If it’s hard for you to get information on the home you’re interested in from the city and you don’t have the opportunity to measure the home yourself, you can hire an appraiser who can do the measuring for you.
Real estate agents also have a lot of experience determining the square footage of houses. They can give a quick estimate of size or help you measure the square footage more carefully.
There are other things to look for when buying a home in addition to its size. Would you prefer a smaller house in tip-top condition or a larger one that needs some TLC? Do you like the design and layout or would you be looking at major renovation work to have it be your dream home? Is the location right? Is it near schools, your work, businesses you like to go to, or parks? Is it in your price range?
The Takeaway
There is a lot to think about when buying a house, and square footage is an important factor as it helps drive the pricing set by the seller. It’s always a good idea to measure for yourself to see if the advertised size of a house is accurate.
Once you’re a homeowner, the square footage will help drive your property tax rate, so it’s helpful to have your own measurements to compare to your tax bill. And even before you buy, your mortgage lender will be looking at the square footage to determine whether the agreed-upon price of the property is a fair one for loan purposes.
Looking for an affordable option for a home mortgage loan? SoFi can help: We offer low down payments (as little as 3% - 5%*) with our competitive and flexible home mortgage loans. Plus, applying is extra convenient: It's online, with access to one-on-one help.
FAQ
Is the garage included in the square footage of a house?
A garage is generally not included when the square footage of a house is measured for real estate pricing purposes. Neither is the basement, even if it is a finished basement.
What is not included in the square footage of a house?
The square footage of a house is a measure of floor space, so a double-height room, such as a vaulted-ceiling living room, would only count as square footage on one floor. Any rooms that are below-ground are also generally not included in the calculation. Also not included? Outbuildings such as a shed or pool house.
Is the square footage of a house measured inside or outside?
The square footage of a house is calculated by measuring the square footage of rooms on the inside of the house.
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