Why is my appraisal taking so long? a PSA (sales, loan)

[2bindenver]

If you are in the market to buy a property and you need a loan, you will probably also need an appraisal.

An appraisal is an opinion of value - using both what other buyers have paid other sellers for a similar product in a similar location, and what it would cost to replace the property.

Years ago, before the meltdown, lenders had a group of appraisers that they worked with. A very few of them did terrible things and cost banks, people, communities lots of money.

Now we have appraisal management companies. They are mainly owned by the lenders - but it adds time, cost and frustration to all parties. The buyer pays for the appraisal, now the appraisal management companies round robin the orders and do "quality control" to the appraisal before it is turned into the lender/underwriter.

It will not get any better. The entry to be an appraiser has never been more restrictive, you now need a college education and an internship. The appraisers we have in the state are aging out. The active appraisers numbers are falling.

If you are writing offers either order and pay for the appraisal the same day as your earnest money is due, pay extra for a "rush" appraisal or write your offers for a 40-45 day close.

I strongly dislike writing amends to change the appraisal, loan objection & closing and possession deadlines three weeks after we first wrote the contract and 5 days before closing.

[mortgageboss]

I guess we are lucky, our appraisers are taking about a week. VA uses their own appraisers and they are taking about two weeks in our market.

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. The laws that have got created after the crash were supposed to give us better valuations, but mostly they have lead to delays and increased costs.

[emm74]

I'm looking into doing a re-fi and same issues with appraisal times. Lots of sales and apparently even more re-fi's going on!