My mother and my aunts and uncles told me that my grandparents bought a house in Brooklyn in 1925. I have a photo of the house taken between 1939 and 1941 by the NYC Department of Records & Information Services. It says the house was built in 1926. I wanted to see what the house looks like now, so I did a Google search and found it on Zillow, which says the house was built in 1910.

How can I find out the correct date?

All the best,
Roberta Berman
Southern California

Searching WEISBERG from Kiev, OPPPENHEIM from Brest-Litovsk and Kiev

Roberta,
Try locating the property on the Sanborn fire insurance maps that were produced in various years. Looks like there was one in 1915 that woukd show what was there in that earlier time period. https://www.loc.gov/item/sanborn05791_032/
 Then there was one done in 1928 for comparison https://www.loc.gov/item/sanborn06115_006/ 

Hope this helps
Lee Goodman
Vermilion, Ohio 

Using Zillow to obtain an accurate date for when a house was built is not a good idea.  Zillow dated the build-date of my grandfather's house many years after my mother had already grown up there!  I knew the house well, and spent lots of time in it myself.  Zillow was WAY OFF.  I have no idea where Zillow gets their information, but I would definitely not rely on its accuracy.

Chana Bonn, Philadelphia
(KAPLAN, PERESMYK, APPELBAUM, GELBURD/GILBERT)

Zillow dates the house in the Bronx that I grew up in as built in 1935.  My parents bought the house new (first owners) in 1940, the year before I was born.  I doubt that it took 5 years to sell after it was built.  I wouldn't trust Zillow.

Robert Hanna
NYC

Researching:
CHANAN/HANAN/HANNE/HEINE/HINEY (Warsaw, Poland); BLUMENBLAT (Sarnaki, Poland); KARASIK, THOMASHOW/TOMOSHOFF, COHEN (Babruysk, Belarus); RUBINSTEIN, BUNDEROFF, PASTILNIK, NEMOYTEN, DISKIN (Minsk, Belarus)

I received a message that answered my question about where to find a date that a house was built in New York City.

"The best way to resolve this is to go to the official source. Here's a
link to the NYC Department of Finance's Property Tax Public Access web
portal:

https://a836-pts-access.nyc.gov/care/forms/htmlframe.aspx?mode=content/home.htm”

The house my grandparents bought was built in 1910. They bought it in 1925 or 1926.

Roberta Berman

Roberta,

Another way to find the year a house was built is to search the address of the house at:
https://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html

There was often a newspaper notice of the house being newly built and up for sale, and a notice of the sale.

You may have to try several variations on the address, i.e. 123 East 10th, or 123 E. 10, 123 12th Street, 123 12 St. etc.

Regards,

Sherri Bobish

Searching: RATOWSKY / CHAIMSON (Ariogala / Ragola, Lith.)
WALTZMAN / WALZMAN (Ustrzyki Dolne / Istryker, Pol.)
LEVY (Tyrawa Woloska, Pol.)
LEFFENFELD / LEFENFELD / FINK, KALTER (Daliowa/ Posada Jasliska, Pol.)
BOJDA / BERGER (Tarnobrzeg, Pol.)
SOKALSKY / SOLON / SOLAN / FINGER(MAN) (Grodek, Bialystok, Pol.)
BOBISH / APPEL (Odessa?)

I went to the NYC Department of Finance Property Tax Public Access web portal and found my parents house, but selecting any of the tabs only goes back 15 years or so in the 21st century.

What are the steps to display old (90 years back) historical data and year built?
--
Michael Herzlich
Delray Beach, Florida USA

Belarus - EPSTEIN, HELFAND, POLLACK
Galicia (Poland, Ukraine) - HERZLICH, TREIBER