I set up my web site at www.appraisaltoday.com in 1998. Every page has my name, postal address, phone number, and email address. If anyone wants to contact me to give me an appraisal assignment, or for any other reason, they can find me. I get a lot of work from my web site.
When working on an article for my newsletters, I often need to contact appraisers. Also, I give out a lot of referrals, as I am very busy and turn down a lot of appraisals. For more information on my appraisal newsletters, click the banner ad below.
My assistant spends a lot of time trying to contact appraisers for my newsletters. When she googles a name, such as Janet Johnson appraiser new mexico, sometimes nothing comes up. If they are on an old directory web site, the postal address is available. Asc.gov only has postal addresses. Some state regulators have phone numbers. Some appraisal association member data comes up, such as the Appraisal Institute.
Email addresses are hopeless. They are very seldom available anywhere.
Often the appraiser has no web site, even a simple one page with name, address, resume, and contact info. If there is a contact link, you must fill out a form to contact the person.
I guess they just want to work for AMCs that contact them. Not interested in any other clients, I guess.
E-mail addresses change and appraisers never seem to remember to change them in listings. I call meetings for a local appraiser group and keeping track of the e-mails is a constant problem. Every meeting I get one or two returns of “not good e-mail address” and this is for a small group. The fact that appraisers are not very good marketers is probably, at least partly, due to having an ordering system for AMC assignments from being on lists.
A related item: I asked why addresses and phone numbers were not available from the State license listings. They said it was a privacy issue. What?
How about because those clients who don’t like your value contact you. When I first began appraising, my mother who was also an appraiser would never give out the business cards. I asked why. She explained that irate homeowners would call as they felt like it, even into the night, so she stopped. I decided to hand out the cards…I’ve probably had to tell a few hundred homeowners, No, I can’t discuss the appraisal, go through your loan officer with any questions, comments, etc. So, yes, it gets to be a bit much. Perhaps, others are seeing this also and just leave it to those who provide work.