UAD 3.6: The Appraisal Industry’s Shiny New Straightjacket
The appraisal industry is bracing for the rollout of the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) 3.6, a supposed game-changer slated for an optional beta in September 2025 and a mandatory debut by November 2026. Promising to drag appraisal reporting into the modern age with a sleeker, property-specific framework, UAD 3.6 has appraisers across the country muttering a mix of cautious hope and outright skepticism. But let’s be real: this overhaul feels less like a bold leap forward and more like a bureaucratic bear trap, threatening to tangle appraisers in a web of complexity while undermining the very craft they’ve honed for decades.
Chad Barker, CEO of Velox Valuations, highlights the potential of UAD 3.6’s dynamic forms and tailored data fields to streamline reporting and eliminate redundant sections, offering a glimpse of efficiency. Yet, this flexibility introduces risks of inconsistency without robust training, potentially leaving appraisers to navigate varying interpretations of the new forms. Velox’s team acknowledges a significant learning curve and concerns about workflow disruptions as stakeholders adapt to the changes. The big question haunting appraisers: how much time will this shiny new system devour from their already packed schedules?
Then there’s the tech side, where things get downright messy. Brian Zitin, CEO of Reggora, points out that some appraisal software providers are stuck in the digital dark ages, their legacy code creaking under the weight of UAD 3.6’s demands. One Reddit user, a former programmer turned appraiser, doubts Total can handle the update without a complete rewrite. Zitin’s advice? Ditch the dinosaurs and hop on a modern platform like his. But even he admits the second hurdle – managing dual pipelines of old and new forms – will be a logistical nightmare. With no word on whether the FHA, VA, or non-QM lenders will adopt UAD 3.6, appraisers could be stuck juggling a classic 1004 one day and its data-hungry cousin the next. One wrong move, and you’re redoing the whole report, delaying loans and testing everyone’s patience.
The real sting comes from voices like Robert Monty Cline, a Certified General Appraiser with 30 years of battle scars from Eastern Kentucky and South Florida. He doesn’t mince words: UAD 3.6 is “dangerous,” a top-down assault on the soul of appraisal work. By funneling nuanced analysis into dropdown menus and 256-character blurbs, the new forms turn complex properties into oversimplified data points, more suited for XML files than real-world markets. Try explaining a hillside easement or a five-mile comp gap in a tweet-sized box — good luck. Cline has seen hybrid reports flop spectacularly in rural areas, with a 99% cancellation rate due to shoddy outsourced inspections. Yet UAD 3.6 doubles down on these flawed models, leaving appraisers liable for garbage-in, garbage-out valuations. And who’s footing the bill for software updates and retraining? Spoiler: it’s the appraisers, with no extra pay or grace period to soften the blow.
The online chatter on Reddit doesn’t exactly inspire confidence either. One appraiser, fresh from a line-by-line review of the new form, calls it a “data mining tool” masquerading as a valuation report, demanding so much detail it feels like a self-contained novel rather than a summary. Fees need to double, they argue, to match the mountain of work. Others agree, urging colleagues to jack up rates and “reset the market” while warning that appraisal factories — those lovely outfits hiring non-licensed analysts in far-off lands — will keep prices low by churning out cut-rate reports. “If you’re still accepting jobs under $400, get out of the business,” one user snaps, blaming lowballers for dragging everyone down. Meanwhile, rumors swirl of delays due to job cuts and privatization chaos at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, with one appraiser noting the VA has zero plans to touch UAD 3.6. Oh, and don’t forget the mobile app mandate, which might send tech-averse veterans packing, shrinking the appraiser pool and maybe — just maybe — pushing fees up.
UAD 3.6’s promise of efficiency is a siren song, luring the industry toward a cliff of complexity and compromise. It prioritizes machine-readable data over the human judgment that’s kept lending honest through market crashes and regulatory storms. Appraisers aren’t the bottleneck; we’re the last bastion of integrity. As we brace for this overhaul, the industry needs more than buzzwords about innovation — it needs a plan that doesn’t leave its professionals out to dry.
- UAD 3.6: The Appraisal Industry’s Shiny New Straightjacket - May 30, 2025
- Bye Bye AMC: A Script to Sideline Appraisal Middlemen - May 15, 2025
- Appraisal Institute’s Harassment, Tests, and Dance with AMCs - May 9, 2025
Well, I just put my license as “retired” for 2025 and the more I read about this new all-in-one form it confirms to me that I probably won’t be activating it for 2026. If I wanted to be a check box chimp I could go get a job at an AMC. Or I could go get a job as a “data collector” for *ervicelin*. The hell with my 30+ years experience and hundreds of hours of education. I’ll go make less than minimum wage after expenses and beat the crap out of my car to keep the efficiency and accuracy of AMCs alive.
In California, there were 8,398 active licenses as of July 1st 2024, and as of today, May 30 2025, there are only 7,775. This is an 11% reduction in 11 months and means there is a daily decline of nearly 1.8 appraisers. In my county (San Diego / 3.3 million), there are 643 active appraisers and only one trainee who has started in the past 11 months.
With full implementation of UAD 3.6, I predict by Jan 1st of 2027 that the state of CA will have 1,000 fewer appraisers or 6,775.
Seek the truth.
It is accelerating, as we always knew it would. Like a snowball rolling downhill. We’re all getting older at the same time. The next few years will see a massive decline, I think your estimate might be conservative.
The more I learn about the new rollout the more I am convinced I don’t want anything to do with it. I’ll take a class after the rollout for the CE, but won’t be doing any of these assignments for the foreseeable future.
That’s what they want. All the old guys to quit. Are FHA and VA also using this?
Focusing on private work and smaller local lenders
Sorry but I do not believe measuring the front step height or interior ceiling heights of all the interior rooms is part of the appraisal process. William Barnes, SRA (appraising since 1978)
Anyone have a paper printable form ready for review yet?
The thing about these new forms; Much of the senior management whom insisted on their implementation are fired and walked out the building. Mr Pulte with FHFA should announce they’re scrapping the new appraisal forms project. If there is additional data wanted or needed, all they needed to do was develop a new form to accompany the existing one as a tag on.
The appraisal grid is a math equation. The purpose of the grid is to equate a physical component or characteristic of a home, to a numerical figure or perspective of a financial market reaction, for straight forward value adjustments. What kind of form developer spreads a math equation that can fit into one page, across multiple pages instead, then leaves out net/gross adjustment indicators? Obviously the new forms are not developed with appraisers in mind but rather expanded data gathering. For who? Image below.
How about some news? Research keywords; (past month) Bill Pulte FHFA
https://www.housingwire.com/articles/how-bill-pulte-has-reshaped-fhfa-and-the-gses/
This week, FHFA announced a partnership between Fannie Mae and Palantir Technologies to root out mortgage fraud.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palantir_Technologies
Big names. Investors, military, dod. That’s excellent. Appraisers will now be scrutinized by the same systems used on real world battlefield. Appraisal data, photos, floorplans; to your house. It’s only another AI system reviewing data, like the kind from Terminator.
https://www.housingwire.com/articles/fhfa-nominee-bill-pulte-discloses-investments-trump-fannie-freddie/
Pulte is better known for social media philanthropy on X than he is as a housing industry figure. He doesn’t have experience in Beltway politics and his work history doesn’t show any deep expertise in housing finance related to the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
https://www.housingwire.com/articles/trump-im-taking-fannie-and-freddie-public-with-implicit-guarantee/
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) has strongly advocated for a formal guarantee from the government. In a statement to HousingWire last week, / “We also believe strongly that any release must include an explicit federal backstop — paid for by the GSEs — of their mortgage-backed securities to protect taxpayers, consumers, and our housing finance system.” / Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent previously said a Fannie and Freddie exit would depend on the implications for mortgage rates.
This may not be the reform we were hoping for. Your tax dollars, hard at work.
Baggins, the new UAD 3.6 report is not a form, its a report. From what I’ve seen and know, its the best opportunity in many years for residential mortgage appraisers to be appraisers rather than simply form checkers. For those who are willing to take the time to adjust to a reporting process from a box checking form process, the client work and fees should be beneficial. Change can be challenging, but the rewards may be very rewarding indeed. I recall the challenge of transitioning from typing reports to having to learn how to line up dot matrix printers, and transitioning from glue-sticking 30-minute developed photos to learning how to download digital photos from funny looking Sony Mavicas – but within days we always saw the benefits and then wondered how we ever did it the old fashion way! Now, once again technology is giving us a new challenge and likely a new benefit to celebrate! Onward and Upward.
As long as you realize that you are contributing to the database which will be used to replace you. It reminds me of a friend of mine who does training videos for a large Japanese auto maker. They recently asked him to help them train AI to take his place. Eyes open, people.
https://content.govdelivery.com/accounts/CODORA/bulletins/3e27f72
CO appraisers will now have to take a repeated mandatory valuation bias course on the fictitious concept of valuation bias every two year cycle.
Ah yes, UAD 3.6. Because what this industry really needed was another shiny layer of confusion pretending to be progress. Dropdown menus and 256-character limits to explain a complex property? Brilliant. Why bother with actual analysis when you can reduce everything to a glorified checklist?
Meanwhile FHA and VA are still sitting on the fence so we get to play the fun game of which format to use and when. Nothing says efficiency like doubling the work just to keep up with a system nobody asked for.
Let’s not forget the added costs and liability dumped right on the backs of appraisers. Retraining, software changes, more room for mistakes and zero increase in pay. But hey, at least the data collectors and AVMs will love the perfectly packaged garbage we’re now forced to feed them.
This isn’t modernization. It’s micromanagement wrapped in a tech suit.
I am heart-sick at all of this – Baggins has me beat in years, but after 24 years, 100s of hours of education, etc., I do not want to be involved with this new UAD either. If I didn’t HAVE to work, I would retire and perhaps find a minimum wage job part time. Just had to put my software on a credit card again because my business does not support the costs, nor the everyday living expenses anymore (and I don’t live in some fancy home). My sister has cancer, and I don’t even have the funds to go see her in another state. A family member just helped out getting brakes for my car – they were grinding. I had a nearly 300 mile trip yesterday to complete some final inspections and most of the work I am getting is rural. I had so hoped that the new administration would look at all this and realize that things need to be significantly altered – not by a form that produces an inaccurate value, nor by non-appraiser field inspectors that do not have the training we have.. I inspect a lot of varied homes – from hillside with WOW mountain/city views, to those on the rural plains. It doesn’t seem like the new UAD is going to allow for these massive variances, and that is completely unfair to both the homeowner and the lender, and IMO would constitute an appraisal that is not an accurate value. It’s no wonder so many are quiting. I have yet to view a full copy of this new form. And, yes, another class on bias to add to the frustration, even though I have never been biased against anyone.
Thanks. You know how many times I’ve reviewed a blank appraisal form with home owners, they’re various representatives, clients so they can have a basic framework to review and understand the existing form once it’s completed? I’ve been training everyone on better understanding of the genius simplicity of the one page adjustment grid for decades.
Where are the appraisers advocates from our own trade groups? Asleep at the wheel, hustling overpriced books, back door meetings with amc execs, traveling around the world, cheating on test scoring, etc. Providing absolutely no resistance to the new forms initiatives or fictitious PAVE task force conclusions which slowly now roll into state policies long after the initiative itself is abolished. They won’t personally ever be completing a gse order again, if they ever did in the first place.
That was disturbing.
I think that it’s time to not waste any more intellectual, emotional, educational, physical or financial effort or energy on this.
I have been in this profession for over two decades. I am not worried about it at all. I have seen a lot and have gone thru a lot. I choose to be optimistic and not pessimistic. I believe and stand on this “YESHUA looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” This is how I have lived my life and for me it has not failed. I will get the continuing education for this and keep moving forward until whatever the next chapters of my life are going to be. I encourage all of you to fret not and be of good cheer because life is too short. Nothing in general stays the same other than for me is GOD in my life.