Texas is a non-disclosure state: when a commercial property sells, the price is not recorded in any public database. Websites that estimate values from public records are guessing, and in commercial property they are usually guessing badly. So how does anyone know what a building is worth?
The honest answer is that value comes from three time-tested approaches, informed by transaction data that lives mostly in private hands: brokers, appraisers, and lenders who were in the deals.
The three approaches
The income approach asks what the property earns. Net operating income divided by a capitalization rate gives a value; a building producing $100,000 a year at an 8% cap rate implies $1.25 million. Investors live and die by this math, and small changes in the cap rate move the value dramatically.
The sales comparison approach asks what similar properties sold for, adjusted for size, condition, and location. In a disclosure state that data is public; in Texas it comes from broker networks and appraisal files. This is where three decades in one market becomes a genuine pricing advantage.
The cost approach asks what it would cost to rebuild the property today, minus depreciation, plus land. It matters most for newer buildings, special-purpose properties, and insurance, less so for older buildings where depreciation is a debate.
What this means for Valley owners
If you own commercial property in the RGV, no website can tell you what it is worth, and the county's appraised value is a tax number, not a market number. A real opinion of value combines income analysis with private comparable data from deals that actually closed.
Since 1993 our family of companies has closed more than $660 million in transactions across the Valley. That file cabinet of closed deals, not an algorithm, is how we price property. When you want a number you can defend, call the people who were in the room when the comps were made.