Closets and USPAP standards, how are they alike? The Appraisal Standards Board (ASB) is treating retired USPAP STANDARDS 4 and 5 like empty closets….. they just had to fill them! The new STANDARD 4 is titled Appraisal Review, Reporting. STANDARD 5 is now titled Mass Appraisal, Development. This ‘Food for Thought’ is going to discuss [...]
Appraising Energy Efficient Home with Few Comps??? Appraising energy-efficient homes when there are so few comps and the properties are loaded with solar panels, tank-less water heaters, low E windows, geothermal heat pumps; it’s like lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac require that an appraiser obtain competency to [...]
Assumptions now missing from USPAP; was it the leprechauns? If only we could blame the leprechauns for stealing the definition of ASSUMPTION from USPAP. And, maybe if it was the leprechauns, they would’ve left us a pot of gold, but no, it was the ASB. USPAP 2018-2019 no longer contains a definition for an “ASSUMPTION” [...]
The definition for ASSIGNMENT CONDITION will not exist until the 2018 – 2019 USPAP publication goes into effect, but where have we seen this term? Previously it was referenced in the SCOPE OF WORK RULE. Are you ready for some tongue-in-cheek? You think the ASB needed to fill the void left behind in the USPAP [...]
Enhanced Property Inspection Waiver (PIW), Fannie Mae What could possibly go wrong!? Wasn’t it less than a decade ago that our tax dollars provided $189 billion to Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae because their poor financial condition rendered them unable to fulfill their mission without our tax dollars via government intervention? No inspection on many [...]
Should you be responsible for confidential information after you have left a firm or organization and no longer have control of the appraisal work file? The Appraisal Standards Board (ASB) Third Exposure Draft public hearing was held in Washington DC on 17 October 2014. The meeting was well attended by state regulators who expressed their [...]
Losses due to mold contamination for your property–owning clients may not be limited to the cost of repairs aka cost to cure. Stigmatized properties can take months, even years, to recover from a blighted image. In fact the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) states in provision AO9: “The value of an interest in [...]
Liability lurks like an alligator waiting for trespassers to fall into its swamp. Many view the Environmental Protection Agency’s RRP rule as a nuisance, at best, and at worst an opportunity to be sued or fined. Smart contractors have already skirted the first and most obvious liability sinkholes, by becoming individual Certified Renovators and earned [...]