Skip to main content

Appraisals, Part Deux (Posted October 26, 2015)

We figured if we threw a little French into the headline of this week’s edition, it would sort of class it up because, let’s face it, the French have given us some of the finer things in life: fine wines, high-end fashion, and hopelessly devoted Jerry Lewis fans.  The world wouldn’t be the same without them.

Three weeks ago, we talked about the Condition Ratings that appraisers use to categorize and support their valuations of homes.  Specifically, we detailed how important it is to read the comps for surrounding homes so you can help your clients realistically price their homes when listing.  We’ve heard back from a lot of you that this has been extremely helpful, so we wanted to revisit the topic of appraisals and give you some more tips that will help you stand out from your peers and impress the daylights out of your clients – we’re talking about upgrades!

Not all upgrades are the same – nor are they worth the same in the eyes of an appraiser.  For example, if your client spent $6K on a brand-new HVAC system two months ago, she’ll be able to get a dollar-for-dollar reflection in the appraisal.  Come on, this is the desert – a new HVAC system is like handing someone a key to Shangri-La and/or Heaven (depending on their philosophical or religious views).  For those clients who are getting ready to put their homes on the market and are considering an HVAC upgrade, if they already have a swamp cooler, give them this advice: definitely install the new HVAC system but keep the swamp cooler, also. 

Another dollar-for-dollar upgrade is a garage.  This applies either to the costs for enclosing a carport or building an entirely new garage onto the property itself.  We’re a car culture, and the appraisers know it.

Here are some other upgrade items that generally fetch consideration from an appraiser in the ballpark of $.30 to $.50 on each dollar spent:

•  Kitchens – no matter how much they love that Viking range or built-in Sub-Zero refrigerator, they need to know they’re only going to get a percentage of their costs in the appraisal
•  Pools – your client may have imported tiles from an Italian monastery and had a pirate ship trucked in from the Bahamas, but they’ll only get so much for them
•  Bathrooms – it’s nice that they can fit the entire family and their three cousins into the bathtub at the same time (kind of weird), but that feature won’t appeal to everyone so the appraisers will only give a percentage
•  Windows – bulletproof, specially glazed, shaped like the silhouette of Jerry Lewis, etc., an appraiser is only concerned about cost of the materials and what percentage they’ll assign


Give us a call about these and other upgrades – we’ll help you look like a rock star!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Naked Truth About Home Buying

It’s highly likely I’ve already written about this, but I’ll try to make it entertaining at least.   There’s a guy who works in ou r office who suffers from kidney stones – and from what he’s described, “suffers” might even be a little too tame a word for it.   As an aside, though, when you ask him how painful the experience is, he gets an odd smile and says, “It’s the most intense pain I’ve ever experienced, but it’s hard to describe.   I’ve heard a lot of people compare it to the pain a woman experiences while giving birth.   To that, I must say, those people are big, fat liars!   I’ve been in the presence of a woman giving birth, twice, and her pain has to be 100 times worse.   They’re passing the equivalent of a Buick.   I’m passing a pumpkin seed.”   He’s always been a colorful fellow. He’s had this wonderful condition for over a decade now, and the stones make their appearance about every 18 months or so.   Up until recently, ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Unlimited Data Can Be Confusing (Posted January 2, 2017)

If I were to walk up to you and ask you to explain your cell phone plan to me, that would be relatively easy, right?   You have three phones, two of which are smart phones so you pay an upcharge of $XX, and you get 4GB of data each month (you usually use just over 2 GB except for those months when you have to take your car into the shop, and they don’t have free WiFi so you end up using a boatload of data playing Candy Crush and watching videos on YouTube): all of this costs you $XXX/month.   Easy enough.   However, if I asked you to explain how you arrived at that particular plan, there’s a 95% chance you’ll just shrug your shoulders and say, “I honestly can’t remember.   It’s all a blur now.”   Why is that?   There are two parts to that answer. The first part is relatively simple to explain: it’s something you see every month and doesn’t change – you’ve become used to seeing it arrive in your mailbox or inbox, and unless there’s a drastic c...
Post a Comment
Read more

Saving Money is Music to Your Ears (Posted January 9, 2017)

For all the “old” people out there, you’ll instantly know the name Daryl Hall.   For those of you who are still on your original set of adult teeth (perhaps because you got your braces off fairly recently), Daryl Hall is a musician (the blonde half of the duo Hall & Oates – the one who DIDN’T have a mustache that looked like it was straight out of an ’ 80s adult film) with a number of albums (albums a re these big, black 12-inch vinyl “platters” that look like a pregnant CD) that have been certified as gold/platinum and hit songs to his credit, some of which he recorded himself and some he wrote for others.   Going back to 2007, he started a show on the internet called Live from Daryl’s House ; in 2011, he took it to cable where it currently airs.   The concept is relatively simple: he has musicians from all genres and eras come to his house to jam with him and his band.   In between songs, they talk about music and memories, and they usually end up eatin...
Post a Comment
Read more