If the DOJ investigation proves fruitful, it is possible appraisal data could be investigated as well… The Department of Justice has sent a Civil Information Demand (CID) notice to CoreLogic. The CID requires CoreLogic turn over documents and answer questions. The article by Rob Hahn explains that the case revolves around not only the search features of the MLS systems, but the contracts and agreements on the use of MLS data by CoreLogic. If this investigation proves fruitful, it is possible appraisal data could be investigated as well. If this is the case, it will be a fast rolling snowball...
VaCAP has received a message from the family of Ken Harney, Real Estate Syndicated Columnist: Dear Friends, It is with great sadness that I write to you to tell you that Ken’s disease has progressed to Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) and that as of today, we are in the care of hospice at home. We both want to thank you for all your prayers, your interest and concern and for the many years of friendship you have extended to us. Happily we are surrounded by our four children and our home is filled with love. Ken is not up to...
Lenders Allies, LLC, an appraisal management company, has agreed to a consent order with the Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board (TALCB). On May 1, 2019 Lenders Allies agreed to a final order neither admitting guilt or denying guilt of violations of Texas law. The case revolved around the investigation of a complaint against an appraiser, which then lead them to Lenders Allies. The appraiser completed 59 appraisals for Lenders Allies over a period of two years as an employee and at no time was the appraiser on Lenders Allies appraiser panel maintained by the TALCB. Was this an administrative oversight...
Appraisers are routinely coerced & intimidated by third parties to violate their independence and integrity… Honorable Committee Members: We are writing to add our voice to that of the Massachusetts Board of Real Estate Appraisers (MBREA is a State Coalition of professional real estate appraisers) in support of each of the above bills. The American Guild of Appraisers is a Guild within the Office Professional Employees International Union (OPEIU) of the AFL-CIO, representing the appraisal and real estate related financial consumer / taxpayer interests of over twelve and a half million AFL-CIO Family Union & Guild Members; their families, retirees...
ALL unintended users are specifically excluded from any right of reliance on this appraisal report… Recently, Mr. Steve Kahane, Board Member of the Association of Texas Appraisers (ATA) wrote a great article in WorkingRE. It included several suggestions for Texas to deal with it’s excessive number (70%-75%) of unfounded complaints against appraisers. An American Guild of Appraisers member in New Jersey who has twice faced this exact kind of complaint abuse reminded me of the article and concurred with its suggestions for his state. Fortunately for our member, New Jersey is not one of those relatively few ‘charge and win...
Why haven’t State Licensing Boards audited AMCs? Things went a bit crazy, but in a very good way! Monday April 29th, VaCAP launched a consumer protection campaign on WRVA 1140 AM News Radio. Our email and social media accounts were non stop. Many of our sister Coalitions in The Network of State Coalitions helped spread the word and shared our Press Release with their members, posted on their websites and on their social media pages. A huge thank you to all our Sister Coalitions for helping us spread the word. In case you missed all the excitement, here is the...
VaCAP Launches Consumer Protection Campaign VaCAP is excited to launch a Consumer Protection Campaign! For months we prepped, we discussed, we negotiated, we wrote, we edited, wrote some more, edited some more… finally, we recorded. We have three 60 second consumer protection announcements airing on WRVA 1140 News Radio starting on Monday April 29th. The three consumer protection announcements will air randomly throughout the day for two weeks. WRVA 1140 News Radio live streams through Radio.com and iHeartRadio so anyone can tune in and listen. The consumer protection announcements will refer listeners to VaCAP’s website for more information where we have added a...
Collateral risk analysis (appraisals being a key element of that) is partially art, partially science. Those two facets are blended inseparably, like a soup…the ingredients can’t be separated. While computers can undeniably perform certain tasks better than humans (such as the handling of large amounts of data) appraisers can perform other absolutely critical aspects of the process better than a machine. The appraiser can actually see the property to be valued, they can utilize their human senses, they can use their judgement based upon what they observe by physically being at “ground zero” (the Subject property), and can then apply...
…North Dakota bankers seeking to eliminate consumer protection benefits associated with appraisals… The real issue of concern to all appraisers is the attempted con job and subtle coercion by officials and State Senators in North Dakota over the ASC. In their letter to ASC regarding their appraisal waiver request, they cite only 170 ‘in area’ appraisers while excluding a hundred so-called out of the area (multiple state licenses). While North Dakota is about the 19th largest state in land area, it is the fourth lowest in overall population. The 2018 population was only 760,077! That makes it among the lowest...
Clarocity changed back to Zaio…screwing over every outstanding appraiser payment… Last week VaCAP shared information on Clarocity Corporation and how the main investor StableView Assets was seizing the shares and foreclosing on the working assets, which includes Clarocity Valuation Services. StableView in turn had an agreement to sell Clarocity Valuation Services to iLOOKABOUT. We warned to proceed with caution or do not proceed at all. We described the situation as a “soap opera.” We continue to monitor them and have learned many things. We debated on sharing this information with everyone, however we feel obligated to keep our members informed. First of concern...
