A few months ago, an AMC sent out an email to all their appraisers saying it was requiring that they include a copy of their work file with the appraisal.
Within a very short period of time after it was sent, I saw the email posted to a Facebook group. There were 356 comments posted. It soon “went viral” spreading all over the Internet. The AMC backed down.
Within the past week, another AMC sent a very rude email response to an appraiser who declined applying for a staff position at the AMC. I saw it posted on a Facebook group. It also went somewhat viral, although not as widely distributed as the workfile email.
Read more, including the original email, in the very interesting Jonathon Miller’s Housing Notes – August 21 edition.
Click here – it is near the bottom of the page.
What does this mean? In the pre-Internet days, often it would take weeks, or months, for appraisers to find out about FHA and Fannie changes, for example. Now it is available within a few minutes.
What’s the downside for appraisers? Even if you post to a group that requires approval, your postings can be obtained by others. Group members can send them to anyone. This is a definite problem if do court testimony. A while ago an attorney asked me how many appraisals I had done in the past 6 months as I had a broken ankle. How did she know about my ankle? She did not subscribe to the email-only discussion group. She asked another appraiser to check online for anything that might help her case. Other appraisers have reported similar situations.
Remember the Primary Rule, which I learned when I first browser opened the Internet to us all. At that time you assumed it could be published on the front page of the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, etc. Now, it is even worse – it can go all over the Internet. The only communication that I know of that is private is the inside of postal mail envelopes. Government agencies can track what is on the outside, but not the inside without a special court order.

Appraisal Today newsletter

2 Comments
  1. Reblogged this on Me, Myself, and I.

  2. Ann, great post. Appraisers exhausted all resources following the “golden rules” of reporting violations and what did we get? Zip, nada, crickets even. So, if the court of public opinion is what it’s going to take to shed light on the culture of corruption, than so be it. I commend you, @JonathanMiller, @voiceofappraisal and all the bloggers for taking the message to the streets, as in….the media. What’s really interesting to me is that this is the news industry participants want, too few in the media are willing to do it. I think they must be beholding to someone, or something………not really 100% sure.

We want to know what you think!! Please leave a comment.