1-24-20 Newz: Amrock suspends CA fee appraisers – Neutrality – Missle Silos

By on January 24, 2020   /   AMCs, appraisal business, appraisal management company, FUN, humor, Mortgage applications, real estate market, Strange homes, USPAP, weird properties   /   Leave a comment
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8 Funny Quotes About Appraiser Work Stress

Just For Fun!!

Excerpts: Real estate appraisal is an exciting and enjoyable profession—for the most part. But every appraiser knows that the job can be stressful at times, especially for those who are self-employed. If you’re having a hectic or frustrating day on the job, it helps to have a sense of humor. Here are some super funny quotes about work stress that we hope will brighten your day.

A few quotes

“‘Yay! It’s the weekend!’ Said nobody who is self-employed.”

“There cannot be a stressful crisis next week. My schedule is already full.” ­— Henry Kissinger

Very creative gifs! Sorry, they don’t work in these emails. To see them, click here

My comment: Very Funny and Realistic!

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12-27-19 Newz: Humor – CA Appraisers 50% Decline – Bracketing – Change Your Templates!

By on December 27, 2019   /   adjustments, appraisers, climate change, FUN, humor, Mortgage applications, new appraisers   /   Leave a comment
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Very Funny appraisal commercials
Just For Fun (and maybe some ideas)

Here are a few titles:
  • Hire An Appraiser… Avoid Getting Into A Stinky Situation!
  • Looking For An Appraiser? Ask Any Cat!
  • Homeowners, Don’t Get Eaten Alive By The Shark

To read more and see the Fun Videos, click here

My comment: I love the humor at https://clevelandappraisalblog.com Fun animated gifs and video commercials!!!

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12-20-19 Newz: Appraiser Wins Lotsa Pizzas – $1B Appraisal Error – Past and Future

By on December 20, 2019   /   AMCs, appraisal business, appraisal management company, bad appraisers, FUN, Mortgage applications, mortgage loan volume, real estate market, unusual homes   /   Leave a comment
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Good News: Appraiser wins $100 worth of Aurelio’s pizza every month for next five years

Just For Fun!!

Excerpt: Alvin “Chip” Wagner thought he received a crank call when Aurelio’s Pizza CEO Joe Aurelio phoned to tell him he’d won 60 months of free pizza in honor of the chain’s 60th anniversary.

“I had the call on speaker and my wife said, ‘I think this is really Joe,’” Wagner said.

To read more, click here

My comment: I have known Chip for many years. He deserves pizza plus a little big of fame ;> Appraiser in the Good Newz!! Thanks to Jonathan Miller for this Fun link!!

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8-9-19 Newz: Evaluations and USPAP – Zoning Codes – Inspection Standards?

By on August 9, 2019   /   appraisal how to, appraisal regulations, Appraisal Standards Board, bifurcated appraisals, evaluations, FHA, Google, Mortgage applications, USPAP   /   Leave a comment
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9 Very Funny Quotes for the Self-Employed Appraiser

Just For Fun!!

Some great, very funny, animated gifs ;>

Here are a few comments:

“The crappy thing about being self-employed is I never believe myself when I call in sick.”

“Things people say: ‘It’s Friday!’ Things self-employed people say: ‘It’s Friday?’”

To read more, click here

My comment: We all need some appraiser humor! Something for everyone in this blog post!! Unfortunately, animated gifs usually don’t work well in these email newsletters. You Just Gotta See Them!!

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6-6-19 Newz: What’s Fannie Doing and Why – Shadow Banks – Photoshopping

By on June 7, 2019   /   Fannie, hybrid appraisals, lender appraisals, mortgage loan volume, real estate market, square footage, Strange homes, unusual home   /   Leave a comment
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Tracking the Economy Through New-Home Square Footage

Excerpt: The U.S. housing market may not be synonymous with the business cycle, as a famous 2007 paper proclaimed, but the ups and downs in housing, which represents a big part of the economy, usually do offer hints about what’s going on more broadly.

That’s why economists closely watch housing market indicators like sales volumes and home prices — as well as how Americans are accessing the market and managing their obligations to mortgages, rental costs, taxes, and so on.

To read more, click here

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3-14-19 Newz: Terrible RE Agent Fotos – Appraiser Article in Rolling Stone – Appraisers and Ipads/Tablets

By on March 15, 2019   /   AMCs, appraisal how to, AVMS, commercial appraisal, data, listings, Mortgage applications, mortgage loan volume, real estate market, Strange homes, unusual homes, weird homes, zillow   /   1 Comment
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The Property Valuation Reckoning is Imminent

How Technology is Highlighting Underwriting’s Shortcoming

Excerpt: some high-level aspects that can be used to get conversations started.

1. Increasing the availability of detailed, property-specific information, including both operational (ongoing) activities and transactions (sale, refinance, etc.).
2. The collection and analysis of macroeconomic, microeconomic, and capital markets influences that affect the real estate industry.
3. Using concepts such as systems thinking, systems engineering, and advanced technology such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and deep learning to design semi-automated models that capture and make sense of both property-specific and larger capital markets factors.

Very interesting ideas and analysis. Long, but worth reading. FYI PropTech is a newish acronym. See the next link.

What is PropTech?

My comment: The article gives commercial examples, but is relevant for residential. I have been watching commercial applications, such as AVMs, attempted since the 1990s. The biggest problem is the lack of data. Costar is the major source of data in many areas and has not allowed its data to be commercially used by AVM developers, as far as I know. For leased commercial properties you must have income and expenses, which is not always available. For some types of non-leased properties, such as owner occupied warehouses, AVMs could work well.

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1-10-19 Newz: Appraisal Firm Gets $15M VC Funding – Terrible RE Agent Fotos

By on January 10, 2019   /   appraisal business, commercial appraisal, future, Mortgage applications   /   Leave a comment
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A Response to: Mortgage Industry Expert Wants to “Eliminate” Appraisers

By Abdur Abdur-Malik
Excerpts: Rather than read the article and shrug, I decided to email the reporter who conducted the interview. I copied a number of the website’s editors and also the industry “expert,” the interviewee herself. Their contact information was available via a simple Google search, so below is an unredacted copy of the email I sent:

My comment: Well written and worth reading. Nothing new, but not the typical appraiser whining and/or ranting. Lots and lots of appraiser comments.
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5-10-18 Newz//Market Value Fallacies, Broken Mortgage Market, Crazy Appraiser Stories

By on May 10, 2018   /   adjustments, AMCs, appraisal how to, appraisal management company, data, hybrid appraisals, Mortgage applications, mortgage loan volume, real estate market   /   Leave a comment
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Is it all a big lie? Are there really 6 fallacies of market value?

By George Dell, MAI, SRA, ASA

Excerpts: Some ten years ago, we saw the start of the economic meltdown. Were appraisers to blame?  Some tried to pin the blame that way. But was there a big lie underneath? The required (federally insured) definition of value has seven distinct elements. Were appraisers doing what they were told?
Seeking entertainment for my Stats, Graphs, and Data Science¹ classes, it seemed fun to see if these assumptions had not been religiously followed.  This led to a PowerPoint slide entitled:
 “Dell Operative definition of market value”
Check it out at:

My comment: Interesting comments plus some humor ;>

In the Trenches, Crazy Appraiser Stories

Just For Fun!!

Excerpt: You’ve all got them… The crazy car chases, the surprising living conditions, the exotic assignments and the unique collectors. Here are a few of our stories we found buzz worthy.
This was a beautiful 3,200 sq ft home with all the extras. After measuring…
The Stories plus 10 comments with more stories.
My comment: I love the foto of the crazy appraiser!!

Which of us does not have a weird experience… or lots of them ;>

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Appraisal Today! No Appraisal Tomorrow?

By on May 3, 2017   /   appraisal business, Appraisal fees, data, Fannie, fees, humor   /   Leave a comment
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Appraisal Today! No Appraisal Tomorrow?

AVMs are a threat to appraisers today and tomorrow!!

By Barry Bates

Is the quasi-provocative title of Barry Bates’ article in the May 2017 issue of Appraisal Today. It’s “quasi” because the central issue, the livelihood threat represented by AVMs, has been around for at least 20 years. It’s provocative because Barry’s research suggests that AVMs, bolstered by artificial intelligence, satellite overlays and more robust attributive data, are a bigger threat than ever.

He also cites a 2015 Oxford white paper that studied 702 U.S. jobs and rated their likelihood of total computerization over the next 10 years; “Appraisers and Assessors” warranted a 90% likelihood. Bates explains why, by 2023, that might as well be a function of the residential market assignment volume, i.e., 10% of 2013 volume. One of the factors he mentions is the erosion of federal rules that once ensured that every new origination for refinance or purchase would be accompanied by a full appraisal of the real property.

Not only has the rule been undermined by a variety of new Fannie/Freddie/VA loan programs that don’t require appraisals, but the federal rule itself was modified in 2015 to give the GSEs power to decide whether any particular loan (or type of loan)was worthy of a waiver.

Another factor (of several) is the availability of “data on steroids”: collateral information (including every field in the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) from past and current appraisals populating the GSE AVMs and database from every appraisal sent through one of the uniform collateral data portals, like Fannies UCDP, which already allows for appraisal “sharing” for aggregators and Fannie’s correspondent lenders (even the 1004MC data can be offloaded to a siding for market analysis).

Bates concludes that all the necessary pieces are being assembled for an artificial intelligence AVM with robustness equal to the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man.

[Editor’s Note. When asked whether his prognostications were a little on the gloomy side, Bates rejoined, I know, I know, ‘The pessimists are right, but the optimists have more fun.’ I mean, hey, even paranoids have enemies! And unfortunately, as a card-carrying neurotic, I’d almost always prefer to be right.]

Bates’ full commentary is in the May issue of the Paid Appraisal  Today. For more

info, go to www.appraisaltoday.com/products

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8-18-16 Newz: Ex-appraiser sentenced , Statistics humor, Flooding

By on August 18, 2016   /   AMCs, data, Mortgage applications, mortgage loan volume, OLYMPICS, unusual home, weird homes, weird properties   /   Leave a comment
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Statistics humor

Three statisticians go hunting. They see a deer and the first one

shoots, hitting three feet left of the deer. The second one shoots, hitting three feet right of the deer. The third one leaps up in joy, yelling, “we got him!”

Thanks to Scott Jura for this great joke! Posted on a yahoo appraiser discussion group.

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Ex-appraiser sentenced to 6 years for mortgage fraud

Excerpt: A Pittsburgh federal jury convicted Jason Moreno, 33, on five counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy in September 2013.

A former appraiser, Moreno overstated housing values and glossed over problems such as a den of black snakes in one house’s basement so that others in the scheme could obtain loans for more than the properties were worth.

U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer resentenced Moreno on Monday to six years in prison and three years of probation.

http://triblive.com/news/adminpage/10811871-74/moreno-court-sentenced

Court documents from 1/16. Lots of very interesting details:

http://www2.ca3.uscourts.gov/opinarch/141568p.pdf

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