I would like to know what year my house was built and who lived here?

Question

I live at 6029 North Broad Street in Philadelphia and I would like to know the history of my home.

Answer 1

You can contact your county's housing administration to find out how old your home is.  Sometime they have a website you can visit online.  Rarely is the previous owners information listed.  They should be able to guide you in the right direction.

Answer 2

Hey Vanessa K - I'm a Realtor/Mortgage Broker in FL, and I think I can help you out...

The easiest way to find out when your house was built is to look at the closing documents.  The year built should be listed in the description as well as on your survey.  Your Homestead Tax Exemption statement (look in your Income Tax filing) will also have the information as well as your tax office.  In Florida, we can check this on-line at our County Tax Assessor's site.  

The homeowner history will also be listed in the tax records, and the Tax Assessor's site should be able to provide the historical information.  

You'll want to pay attention to the Homestead section.  If the owner claimed the exemption, that means the owner lived in the house.  If no exemption was claimed, that means one of three things:  1) the house was a 2nd home, 2) the house was an investment home that is rented out, in which case it'll be difficult to track the renters, or 3) the house was purchased for other family members to live in (e.g. parents who purchase a house for kids to live in while attending college or purchased for elderly parents/elderly parents transferring house into kids' names to prepare for entrance into long-term care facility or by-pass Probate after death.

Another place you can check for ownership history is your county plat map office.  Sometimes, you can find plat maps in a local library (when I lived in MI back in the 70s, this was the case).  I wouldn't suggest this route, however, because plat maps are HUGE and a pain to navigate.

I looked up the address on your phila.gov site and listed the link in the Source box.  The link should take you to the Property Inquiry detail page that shows the current owner, taxes, etc.  If you cannot get there, then go to phila.gov and do a property search.  Just follow the the instructions and links, and you should get where you need to go.  If you have difficulty, shoot me an email off-list on my site (listed in Source box) and I will email you the exact pages/information.

Hope this helps.

Best,

d.