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General Appraisal
Who Is the Real Appraiser?
by Administrator on Jul 25, 2013 • General Appraisal • 2472 Views
In a way improperly licensed or unlicensed parties are acting like appraisal management companies or AMC's, taking appraisal assignments from parties and then assigning them to appraisers. The problem with using that argument to defend their actions is that they are not AMC's, just appraisers or unlicensed parties who think they are being entrepreneurs. There are no AMC protections for a commercial appraiser who takes an assignment from an unlicensed or residentially licensed firm. If you have a subcontractor agreement with a residential appraisal firm, does the firm you are contracting with really have the authority to manage you if it is owned by a residential appraiser?
What is Allocation?
by Administrator on Aug 9, 2013 • General Appraisal • 4252 Views
Allocation is described in the text books as an appraisal method that is based on balance and contribution. Land value to total property value ratios derived from lot sales and finished residential home sales for example can provide an appraiser with an approximation of site value knowing a properties sales price, or the value of a vacant when the total sales price is known.
Why Appraised Values Don't Always Reflect Reported Price Increases
by Administrator on Aug 28, 2013 • General Appraisal • 3333 Views
One of the problems with general statistics in real estate is that the numbers that are thrown out to the public usually describe only a subset or a specific group of properties. If a Board of Realtor's report or Home Builder's report indicated that sales prices were up 20% in for example Phoenix over the last year, that doesn't mean that all dwelling units increased in value by that amount.
AVM's and Commercial AVM's 2013 Update
by Administrator on Aug 28, 2013 • General Appraisal • 2264 Views
The public has had more than an introductory look at a number of high profile residential AVM's available on the Internet over the past 5 years, and what is their opinion? I have heard from many users and received nothing but unsolicited negative feedback. People tell me "the AVM is high or its low or it changes the value of my home overnight for no particular reason." I have had no one ask me as an appraiser "what are you going to do for a living now that AVM's are doing your job?"
Reasonably Probable Change
by Administrator on Dec 3, 2013 • General Appraisal • 2661 Views
As an appraiser it is my understanding that if a property being appraised is not currently zoned for a specific use but it is planned for a use then there is a reasonable probability that the planned highest and best use will be realized. Here in Clark County Nevada people buy and sell land and rely on government planning. For example, if a property is zoned “R-E” or rural estates residential but is planned for a service commercial use the property is sold with the expectation that the County will make good on the planned land use and allow for its commercial development.
What Does the CU Collateral Underwriter Really Do
by Administrator on Jan 29, 2015 • General Appraisal • 1951 Views
My opinion is that regardless of what appraiser opinions are of FNMA's CU (Collateral Underwriter), the process is in point of fact a way for the government to take away an appraiser's right to conclude his or her own appraisal opinion. When someone is second guessing your appraisal process or your final appraised value they are second guessing your judgment.
Appraiser Inconsistency
by Administrator on Feb 13, 2015 • General Appraisal • 2115 Views
I always tell my clients when I know that there is going to be another appraisal done on their property that the other appraiser will likely conclude a value opinion close to mine. It makes them feel good to imagine that since we are both looking at the same market and the same comparable sales that they will come to a very similar conclusion. As appraisers know however there is no guarantee that the other appraiser will conclude a value within 5% of your value, in fact the other appraiser may conclude a value opinion that is 10% or more different and that is the kind of difference that can kill a real estate deal. Most appraisers are using the same databases, they view the building in the same way and they take similar photographs of the improvements so how can such a big difference in value be concluded by two appraisers?
The Value of an Appraisal
by Administrator on Jul 24, 2015 • General Appraisal • 2003 Views
Markets improve, sometimes after years of price decreases and long periods of flat, stagnated prices. It's the kind of change that real estate investors and speculators wait patiently for. If you want to make money in real estate you don't buy after prices have hit their all-time high, you buy when prices are low and the market is moving up. When the real property markets begin to change I always get phone calls. "Can you tell me what the value of retail buildings are?" Or "can you tell me how much of an increase there has been in the northwest vacant land submarket?" I understand that there are owners who may be getting phone calls and even offers that they have not received in years. It's great to see the activity, there is nothing worse than flat market that offer no gains year in and year out.
Avoiding an Appraisal
by Garrett Steele on Aug 7, 2015 • General Appraisal • 2048 Views
Most buyers and sellers of real estate just want to keep their expenses as low as possible. They will volunteer the fact that they don't want an appraisal, don't want to pay for an appraisal and don't see the need for an appraisal. When you are dealing with other people's money "OPM" however it's hard to get away from an appraisal being required. Banks are one of the biggest users of appraisal services, beyond the fact that they have federal requirement to appraise real property assets for federally backed mortgages, they simply don't want to find out that they just loaned money on a property and it's not worth what they loaned. So it's tough to avoid an appraisal when you are working with a bank. There are however exceptions. If you loan is only going to have a loan to value ratio of say 50% there is a good chance that the bank will just waive the appraisal.
The Changing Market for Appraisals
by Bill Rigdon on Aug 14, 2015 • General Appraisal • 1963 Views
I for one am concerned about the future of the appraisal business. It’s not like it’s the first time that I have become concerned but it seems I’m having to reevaluate my future in the industry more often than I had in the past several years. It’s my opinion that the score is currently Appraisers 0, Negative Influences 10. Here are some of the reasons why I think it’s getting more difficult to remain an appraiser: Fewer Reports Are Needed The number of appraisal reports ordered over the last few years has come down dramatically even through the mortgage interest rate is down, sales are supposedly up and mortgage rates are near a record low at 3.9%.
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