AMC Fair Housing Mythodology
AMCs are on notice to cease demanding and insisting that appraisers do digital staging. You’ve seen the AMC’s orders. “Appraiser is to obscure, blur or remove individuals from photos.” Why? Fair housing laws say so, that’s why. Do they? I had my first settlement conference with an AMC recently. Appraisers have been participating in settlement conferences with Appraisal Board members and Department attorneys for years. Because there is no Board for AMCs, the opportunity falls to me. At issue was the ubiquitous “client requirement” involving digital masking of people from images. While lenders and AMCs wave the Fair Housing penalty...