Lower-Liability Appraising by David Brauner, Editor According to John Harris, appraising machinery and equipment is USPAP-compliant appraisal work that offers more opportunity and less liability than appraising real property. “The clients for these appraisals are not mortgage brokers/lenders, so the first thing our graduates tell us is that they are so happy to be doing…
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Editor’s Note: The following Q&A about how to report a crooked floor in the face of pressure (from a crooked lender), demonstrates what a powerful tool a good Scope of Work can be in deflecting pressure, limiting liability and producing more professional reports. Scope of Work Q&A: Deflecting Pressure, Reducing Liability by David Braun, MAI,…
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Editor’s Note: This story is one in a three-part series: Pressure: Dealing with It; Comp Checks: Learning to Live Without You and Getting Full Fees. Find more at www.workingre.com. Comp Checks: Learning to Live Without You According to most appraisers, the only way to “move on” when it comes to comp checks is to make...…
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“The USL Documenter provides professionalism to my appraisals and keeps me from worrying about liability issues. I wouldn’t send out an appraisal without it.” – Greg Beck Editor’s Note: According to the developer David Braun, MAI, SRA, the Report Documenter Software operates in any modern Windows environment and no longer requires MS Excel to run....…
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Clarifying Copyright (by Someone Who Knows) by Tim Vining, MAI As the appraiser who brought suit in federal court for copyright, I wish to address and clarify some comments made in writing in other appraisal industry publications. Whether you realize it or not, once pen is put to paper the author has copyright protection. In...…
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Editor’s Note: Author Beverly Bayer, SRA says that lenders, fed up with shoddy appraisals, are laying traps for unsuspecting appraisers. Fannie Mae has said as much, indicating that one of goals with the new forms is to make appraisers more accountable for their work. In this story, Bayer exposes several “gotcha” traps designed to snare…
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A Word of Caution: Hold your Tongue by David Brauner Sometimes it is better to count to 10 before speaking or writing in anger: especially if you don’t want to be sued. One appraiser learned the hard way. Recently, an appraiser was planning to fire off a letter to his state banking commission along the...…
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Compliant Appraisers: Creating a Level Playing Field A growing number of appraisers are compelled to turn in colleagues for what, in their judgment, is incompetence and/or fraud. Here is a template of an actual complaint which was heard and acted upon by a state board. Phil Rice, appraising eight years, said he filed this complaint...…
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Editor’s Note: As the copyright controversy simmers, WRE takes another look- making source documents available and reporting that appraisers are not alone in grappling with this issue: agents, inspectors and surveyors also have an interest in copyright protection and controlling work product. And there is the issue of AVMs and the prospect of a landscape…
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Appraiser Wins Copyright Suit: Now What? And they said it couldn’t be done. Tim Vining, MAI becomes the first appraiser in the U.S. to successfully sue and win for copyright infringement of his intellectual property – his appraisal. The culprit is a real estate broker who lifted Vining’s work for use in a sales brochure.…
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