Do tandem bedrooms count as bedrooms in appraisals?

Do Tandem Bedrooms and Garages Impact Value?

 Excerpt: There is less privacy in the one bedroom because it must be walked through to get to the other bedroom. This is considered to be functional obsolescence.
This type of situation is most often found in older homes. I have seen this type of situation many times on the second floors of many bungalow or cape cod style dwellings I have appraised. Although, it can exist in any style home.

My comment: I see tandem rooms a lot and sometimes tandem garages. I think I have finally convinced the local agents not to call them bedrooms. Of course, some insist on using Assessor data, which has not been updated since 1979, when Prop 13 passed and re-assessments stopped unless there was a sale or new construction.

ADD LINKS FOR HUMOR AND BIZ TIPS

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this 10-11-18 long blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

 

=====================================================

Read more!!

Sometimes “being nice” is best for appraisers

A Spoon Full of Sugar (when dealing with annoying borrowers, AMCs, neighbors, etc.)

Excerpt: Remember when you were a kid? No, not a goat. You know, a young human. Remember your parents giving you that thick, pink, nasty tasting medicine, called an antibiotic? While we hated the taste, we needed the medicine. And, after a few days, we began to feel better.

When it comes to appraisals, the information they provide can help to protect us from making a bad financial decision. However, there are times when the results of an appraisal may leave a bad taste in the mouths of those reading the report.

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this long 10-4-18 blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

Read more!!

Appraiser conflict: objective/impartial vs. what clients want

Do You Have Two Appraiser Brains?

By George Dell
Excerpt: One appraiser brain says you must be “independent, impartial, and objective.” (USPAP) It wants to be good. It wants integrity and to sleep peacefully at night.

But there’s another brain. It’s primal and wants to survive. It has other responsibilities: meet the bills, feed the family, pay the mortgage, and pay government taxes/fees. And recorded in this brain is that part of the standards which say: Do what your clients expect; do what everyone else does. As paraphrased, the sole guides to an acceptable scope of work.

Worth reading. Short. Plus the comments.

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this 9-27-18 long blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!

Read more!!

Appraising Cabins

 

Why We Love Cabins

Excerpt: Set against the chaos and complexity of contemporary life, the dream of eloping to the woods to live out a simple and unfettered existence is an increasingly tempting fantasy. The perfect wooden cabin plays a large part: appealing not just for their material honesty, attractive geometry, and breathtaking surroundings, cabins are, at least in popular imagination, a symbol of unity between man and nature, the humble abode of adventurous pioneers and poets-and, more recently still, the object of our wanderlust.
Great photos and info at:
My comment: When I first moved to the Bay Area in the late 1960s I rented a small cabin in the Santa Cruz mountains. It was high in the mountains with a great view of the distant ocean. I had to learn to use a chain saw and an axe to split wood, be careful using water during the dry season so I didn’t run out of water in the water tank, etc. I drove up and down a very steep, long and narrow one lane road my cabin. When winter storms knocked down trees and blocked the road, I helped a neighbor cut and remove them. I will never forget lying on the ground staring up into a grove of redwood trees nearby. I still have a great fondness for redwood trees. Of course, now it is fully developed with a lot of big homes…

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this 9-6-18 long blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

==========================================

Read more!!

New 1004 appraisal form?

 

To Form or Not To Form? What will it be? A new 1004?

By George Dell
Excerpt: What’s the difference between a form and a data entry page? Will “forms software” even be necessary? Will the result require less appraiser expertise – or more? Will it encourage the “form-filler” people, or will it require some real understanding of problem identification, data selection, predictive methods, and communication? Will the transmittal require both an electronic data stream and human actionable views?

Will it require appraisers at all? Or will the “data analysts” simply create the ultimate model.

These are big questions. From my point of view, some of the answers are obvious. But first, let’s outline how we can even ask the right questions . . .

My comment: Fannie Mae has been planning on revising the forms. I have known George for quite a while, heard him speak and taken his class. Looks like people are finally starting to pay attention to what he says about stats, data, etc.!! His blog posts are fine, but sometimes you want more. The September issue of the paid Appraisal Today will have George’s 6 page article, “Why, Why, Why? Why do we put “stats”, “graphs”, “data,” and “science” together?”

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this 8-30-18 long blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

===========================================

Read more!!

Very Strange Appraisal Adjustments

Schizophrenic Adjustments

By Dave Towne
Excerpt: Appraisers, I’ve written in the past about what I believe are strange ways to report adjustments in appraisals, and suggested ’rounding’ is a perfectly acceptable way to report them. This is largely due to buyers and listing agents thinking and listing in $100 increments – not down to exact dollar amounts.

During the past couple of weeks, I ‘came in contact with’ two separate appraisals done by different appraisers on totally different properties, in different market areas.

What struck me was the incredibly precise adjustments made for only certain items in these reports, while the rest of adjustments were ’rounded’ to even dollars. Here are the examples:

Click here to read more:

My comment: I love the image at the top of this post….. sorta creepy but very appropriate ;> Who do you think it represents?

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this 8-23-20 long blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

Read more!!

Appraisal Report certifications

Certifications: Understanding What You’re Signing

By Tim Andersen, MAI
Excerpt: Next is another declaration to aid in the transparency of the analyses behind the appraisal. “I have performed no (or the specified) services, as an appraiser or in any other capacity, regarding the property that is the subject of this report within the three-year period immediately preceding acceptance of this assignment.” Here, the intent is to prevent the client from perceiving the appraiser is in any way biased for or against the subject property by disclosing any relationship the appraiser may have with the property.

Occasionally appraisers appraise the same property numerous times for different entities. This component of the Certification discloses the appraiser has received knowledge of the property from having provided a past service involving the property. Because of the use of the word services, it is clear if the appraiser has provided any services relating to the property, the appraiser must disclose them.

My comment: When I used to teach USPAP (before the Appraisal Foundation mandated what to teach) I always spent time on the 1004 certifications. I suspect that was the first time that attendees read them. I make my own certifications for my non-lender appraisals.

Appraisal Business Tips 

Humor for Appraisers

Covid-19 Residential Appraisers Tips on Staying Safe

For Covid Updates, go to my Covid Science blog at covidscienceblog.com

Click here to subscribe to our FREE weekly appraiser email newsletter and get the latest appraisal news!!

To read more of this long 8-9-18 blog post with many topics, click Read More Below!!

Read more!!

7/26/18// Newz .Funny Appraisal Ad, IL C/R Survey, Basements and GLA

The best appraisal ad I have ever seen – cats playing instruments, song appraisal re-title contest, etc.

 Just For Fun!

Short Excerpt: … submit a favorite song title– be it classical, jazz, rock, religious, country, or whatever- adapted to the appraisal business. Here are a few examples for starters (with a little literary license):
  • Appraising Pink Houses (John Cougar Mellencamp)
  • Measuring the House that Built Me (Miranda Lambert)
  • What Goes Up, Must Come Down (Spinning Wheel by Blood Sweat & Tears, describing the housing market)
  • Everything Happens to Me (Frank Sinatra)
Subject  line: Wednesday Wild Ideas from Intercorp
If you didn’t open it, or “opted out” of getting ads, Click here to read the full “ad” and see the cats!!

My comments: I have been doing ads for my newsletters since 1992. Boring. Boring. Boring. Yesterday’s Intercorp ad was the best I have ever seen!! Of course, my favorite is the cat playing cello. I play electric cello so I can amplify and use effects in my experimental music band, playing together for 8 years ;> Here’s link to a gig:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk8zXPJ6hVA

AI Education

Great Spaces: Lakefront Living Goes Luxe

Just For More Fun!

Excerpt: To celebrate summer, in this month’s edition of Great Spaces, we’re highlighting some seriously serene lakefront properties, from Minnesota all the way to sunny Florida.
Click here to see the fotos:

Read more!!

7-12-18 Newz// 3 Story Homes, Auction Prices, Portable Architecture

The Most Popular Article From Last Week’s Newsletter: Former Appraiser’s Hot Dog Stand!! FYI, unusual and weird stuff is very popular with appraisers ;>

Three-story Single-family Homes and Townhomes

Excerpt: Of the 729,000 single-family detached homes started in 2017, a little over 18,000 (2.5 percent) had three or more stories, according to National Association of Home Builder tabulation of recently released Census data.

In contrast, the 23,000 3-plus story townhomes represent 22.0 percent of single-family townhome starts.

More info here:

My comment: 3 story detached homes are not popular in very many areas. It is a long walk up to the 3rd floor. I have appraised them (attic conversions of a classic older home to a master bedroom, for example). I always look to see if an elevator can be added – usually has to be on the exterior of the home. Definitely a functional problem. I rarely see them on existing homes, except for attic conversions. Some newer detached homes have a small room on the 3rd story – family room, extra bedroom, etc.

For townhomes, I have seen a significant increase in 3 story new construction townhomes in my city (within the past few years) and other Bay Area cities. The first floor is a garage plus entry, second floor living room and kitchen, bedrooms on 3rd floor. Very profitable for home builders, especially in areas with high land prices and infill tracts. I have appraised them and the owners did not object to the 3 floors. There are sometimes a few townhomes that are 2 story.

My first apartment when I moved to San Francisco in my 20s was a third floor walkup. I vowed Never Again ;>

Read more!!

7-5-18 Newz//Busy or Not?, Prices Dropping, Appraiser Hot Dog Stand

Who’s busy and who’s not?

Varies widely around the country. Maybe it depends on housing affordability? See articles below. But, it is really hard to say what causes the geographic variation for appraisers.

Many areas have seasonal variations, but now we are in the traditionally strong summer months, so it is clearer that some areas have less appraiser work.

How do you tell if it is down? AMCs dropping fees. Fewer emails, phone calls, etc.  Other appraisers complaining.
What about steady to increasing biz? Decent fees, turning down work, etc.

Changes in turn times and fees when biz slows down

Appraisers just don’t seem to understand that AMCs work for lenders and try to do what they want.

Why do AMCs/lenders want faster turn times?
AMCs work for lenders. They are competing on turn times primarily, like they always have. Business is very competitive and is declining.

Value pressure?
Is there more value pressure from some of your AMC clients?
Some lenders want to close as many loans as possible and keep profits from dropping.

Why do AMCs drop fees?
Direct lenders have their own fee panels don’t send out bid request to lots and lots of appraisers. Their fees don’t change dramatically. They have never focused on changing appraisal fees frequently. AMCs need lower appraisal fees to keep their profits up, just like you do. I have always thought of AMCs as very large appraisal companies that mostly fee out all their appraisals.

Read more!!