Another ‘Bad’ Word to Avoid!
To lighten the load somewhat from discussions about current highly restrictive language use in appraisal reports that tends to circumvent actual reality and truth – which can positively or adversely impact property market value, replaced with only generic, non-offensive words, I present this cartoon.
It’s another word to avoid using:
Obfuscation of real and accurate market data using correct written descriptions, replaced with wokeism to foster an unworkable ideological agenda, is one reason why skilled appraisers are shifting their work to non-mortgage lending clients who actually want to understand the true reality of regional and neighborhood areas, and how market values are affected.
Appraisers who work for such clients are respected, and are valued positively. This is the exact opposite of what the mortgage lending arena has become for appraisers who only work in that space.
Plus, fees for non-mortgage lending work are much better than the beat down mortgage lending appraisers endure. This assumes that the appraiser does not incorporate the low pay mentality when engaging with private clients. If you are experienced and have higher level skills, don’t sell yourself short.
Dave Towne on e-AppraisersDirectory.com
- Another ‘Bad’ Word to Avoid! - November 20, 2023
- Appraisal Bias Mantra is Largely False Reporting - November 8, 2023
- Reality of Today’s Appraisal Environment - October 27, 2023
The appraisal profession today is unrecognizable compared to when I bailed out in 2009. 95% of your time today is spent on keeping with new regs and forms, keeping up with the latest court battles, etc; leaving 5% for valuation.
Why would there be a reason to use the word “crazy” in an appraisal? I’m confused…
At this time, there is insufficient market support to adequately support the contract price of the subject property. The seller and sales agent are crazy. – There you go. ?
I had one kicked back to me last week for the descriptor ‘mature landscaping’.
Please remove the word ‘mature’.
Clownworld…..Anything and everything now is an offensive buzzword.
Old white men complaining about “woke” – that’s a great look for our profession!
A quite adept take at parroting the woke narrative. If you were still in the mortgage lending realm looking out for regular everyday consumers, you’d know this article is in response to a slue of update emails from several gse related clients talking about Freddies latest expansion of even more everyday words everyone routinely uses, now specifically prohibited for appraisers. If realty agents had to abide these rules their listings would be nothing more than some numbers, a few photos, and blank text areas. I’ll post the link below in a second. These policies will reach out to the commercial world soon.
Oh the Irony
Apparently the word “school” gets flagged
Well said.
Twenty years ago as a commercial appraiser I had the opportunity to value two churches. All sorts of worship facilities are bought, sold and financed. So I added “churches” in my resume along with all the other property types I’ve valued over the years. About five years ago I was instructed to remove “church” from my resume and replace it with “religious facilities”. That was acceptable until today when I was informed that “religious facilities” might be offensive. These words are only offensive to COMMUNISTS which I personally find to be offensive.
Have you noticed these tech systems now adopting a different date format, where the year now comes first, just like in China? New rule of thumb; The first day of this month is no longer 11/01/23. You must clearly state; 11/01/2023. Because under the other countries date standards, the date would be interpreted as 01/23/2011.
Communism and socialism is not just on the way. It’s here. Just one problem; We will never go with these new programs or mindsets. Your new constant counter; We did not vote for that! Irregardless of what the mandate, edict, or new thing you are supposed to follow is; If there was no vote, there is no authority to back. Even then, if a law which was voted for is unconstitutional, that law is also null and void. Hows globalism working out for you today?
Pleeeease! The UK uses the “communist” date structure that you find so awful. Let’s not go back to the 1950s with McCarthyism. The sky is not falling and appraisers can adjust if they are not looking for a fight.
The UK is not guiding much policy in America. But China is. Try again.
I like Ike, and am sticking with metric and traditional American date formats. But this is a more modern world and civil rights have advanced. We do not need to revisit these racially based issues every day of the week anymore. We do not need anymore socialism or welfare, or any other special protections for anyone. We need to dial the majority of all that back. But race bating sells, and so does the idea of a free lunch. Which pays very well for those whom are still willing and eager to engage with that rhetoric. Every time a new government program is implemented, every time welfare is distributed, every time some new rule comes forth to benefit one person at the expense of another; someone gets paid much more than most people dare to realize.
https://millercenter.org/president/eisenhower/domestic-affairs
At the end of 1954, the Senate voted to censure McCarthy. Never again was the senator a major force in national politics. During the four years that he had the spotlight, however, McCarthy ruined many reputations by making reckless and unsubstantiated charges. Eisenhower played a significant, albeit limited, role in finally curbing McCarthy’s power.
https://sf.freddiemac.com/articles/insights/more-objective-appraisals-a-practical-guide-for-appraisers
Let’s play a word game; How many words mentioned here can one fit into a reasonable and non biased appraisal statement.
Bottom Line: A.I. is now in charge on giving English 2.0 lessons. Ask the Appraisal Foundation if you will receive college credits.
AI. Merely a program, programmed to act on behalf of the developers intended usability metrics.
Check out this illuminating article. Catch some important insights how ‘artificial intelligence’ (keyword; artificial) applies logical reasoning.
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/chatgpt-ai-covid-vaccine-dna/
The problem is not the reviewers because i think AMCs and possibly lenders, are using canned computer programs that look for buzzwords in a report. I doubt if anyone reads these reports for reviews. One client asked me to remove the word “poor” from my report when i was talking about the “poor condition of the roof”. I refused
Lenders and amc’s may have additional programs to use keyword recognition, but primarily you are talking about the day one certainty reviewer programed and other collateral underwriter programming codes for reviewers. We talked years ago circa 2015 when these programs were implemented how underwriters daily review quotas went from ten to twenty, to forty, fifty, or a hundred or more ‘reviews’ a day. They don’t read reports, that’s what CU and XML requirements are all about.
They submit the appraisal, the review programs scrape all data via xml, and a long list of checklist type review data is put forth. Some lenders have more quality reviewers and underwriters than others. Not sure if this is the right link but somewhere in the GSE review data is the various underwriter material which can help appraisers understand how the review processes work. Try researching the issue as if you were an underwriter looking for guidance.
https://singlefamily.fanniemae.com/learning-center/originating-and-underwriting/collateral-underwriter-learning-center
Examples of ‘additional’ review protocols.
https://www.clearcapital.com/products/clearcollateral-review/
Summary
https://singlefamily.fanniemae.com/job-aid/collateral-underwriter/topic/collateral_underwriter_introduction.htm
This is interesting and a new find I ran across right now looking for links for CU reviewer checklists. I’ll try to make time to review. Some sort of document regarding the 2023 call to letter writing action regarding regulation of avm utilities. Geesh, I was practically begging more people to write letters but only a dozen or less appraisers did so. This appears to be an analysis of that which deserves some additional scrutiny and review from appraisers. Not sure if this is pre letter writing call or after but found it interesting with like a three minute skim review, so posting anyways.
https://files.consumerfinance.gov/f/documents/cfpb_automated-valuation-models_proposed-rule-request-for-comment_2023-06.pdf
Yea, gotten to the rediculous. I used to use “places of worship” non denominational if noted in the defined neighborhood. I was asked to remove any reference to religion. So, in reality, I was told to falsify my report through ommision. Such bs.
Interesting factoid; The HR hiring policies drive much of that sort of gray area stipulation for language use. Looks like you’ve got a woke staff on your hands. Find another lender and you’ll most likely see those stipulations just disappear without any actual reporting language changes. Then again, the reports trade hands between so many different entities, may be best to just assume that all the time. I like to refer to this as color language. Like how in baseball the color announcer will get away from stats and say all those zany things. That’s the color or entertainment value. Just be pragmatic and logical. What was that old tv series; Facts, and only the facts. They don’t want the color commentary. The rub is the review staff may be so poorly educated in grammar and English that they can’t distinguish the difference between accurate description and biased terminology, so they tend to place everything in the latter category which they are not sophisticated enough to understand. That is what ‘woke’ is, a trash bin for the ignorant where everything they don’t jive with from their personal lives is deemed as biased. On this side of the fence referred to as a snowflake. You should see the utterly embarassing language my wife deals with in her job, like people actually type in wat instead of what, axe you a question instead of ask, and other such nonsense. They don’t even know it’s not accurate language use because they spend their entire lives on social networking via mobile devices. The internet; where dreams go to die.
Also, fyi, get a dang browser based spell checker integrated already, it will highlight mis spelled words as you type literally anywhere on the net, so you can then just right click and pick the right spelling. Ridiculous, or redonculous? You’re the quarter back, you make the call! That’s why I like firefox, all those add ons are readily available and easy to use. The about config menu is seriously a cut above anything chrome or ms tools have to offer. Talk to me about anti fingerprinting technology, super cookies, limiting prefetch, predictive, so many others. And then try out privacy badger, it’s super fun, and easy to use. Advanced selections takes you to adblock plus, ublock, umatrix, ghost scripting, other various automation assistant items. Then get malwarebytes alongside S&D. Thanks.
A fellow appraiser sent me the following which was in an order she did not accept. Of note, the fee was $225 and the turn time was 3 days. Scary that for $225 these AMC’s/lenders want a drive-by appraisal with the promise to be an expert witness in the future.
Please copy this URL into your browser to see Stewart Valuation Intelligence’s Best Practices and First Impression expectations:
FHA Order Number: –
Bankruptcy or foreclosure assignment may require the appraiser as an expert witness.
Stop and Notify:
Stop and contact your vendor manager (VM) immediately if any of the following apply:
If not able to provide testimony as an expert witness for bankruptcy or foreclosure assignment, withdraw from assignment immediately.
Seek the truth.