Home appraiser visit

January 19, 2009 4:33 PM

Help! We are (hopefully) refinancing to take advantage of lower mortgage rates and we got a call telling us an appraiser will be coming tomorrow morning. Do we have to stay up all night scrubbing and cleaning or is the spotlessness of the house not something they are concerned with?
posted by 543DoublePlay to Home & Garden (15 answers total)

Unless your house is a complete wreck, like mine, I can't imagine cosmetic cleanliness makes that much of a difference. I think they look at the infrastructure condition, number and size of bathrooms, closets, kitchen size and condition, that kind of thing. Remember they are sizing up what they could re-sell this for should you default on the loan. But that is just my opinion,
I would love to hear others views on this.
posted by archaic at 4:49 PM on January 19, 2009

State of the house matters, so if you had more time, minor repairs would be in order. But "Is my place too dusty?" is not at issue.
posted by Tomorrowful at 4:51 PM on January 19, 2009

A previous appraiser, while looking over a $300K+ house my parents were buying, has a huge issue with the fact that there were no carpets in two of the bedrooms (it cost $3K to install hardwood floors--sure wasn't much when compared to the overall value of the house). Initially, she even refused to issue an appraisal because of that.

So, yes, if they send someone who has trouble seeing beyond such petty cosmetic issues, you might be better off taking the care to clean your house. tonight
posted by halogen at 4:57 PM on January 19, 2009

Best answer: We just had our house reappraised last week. While a little cleaning didn't hurt, the appraiser was more interested in: the layout/condition of the house, improvements/upgrades already made (we finished an attic & installed a bathroom), and the comps in the neighborhood. The surrounding homes have more of an impact than I imagined and hoped for.

Bottom line, the value of your neighbors homes has more say on the final figure than dusty bookshelves.
posted by smelvis at 5:06 PM on January 19, 2009 [1 favorite]

The other answers here are interesting--I've never had an appraiser come inside the house to do an appraisal. They've taken exterior measurements, asked me about the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, and looked at sales of similar houses. But they've never come inside at all, let alone walked through evaluating the rooms. This was true when we refinanced a couple of years ago.

Obviously, from the previous answers, YMMV.
posted by not that girl at 5:08 PM on January 19, 2009

One bank's appraiser never even came inside but did a roadside evaluation, another did a walkthrough and god, talked constantly, gossiped about local political figures, his family, the people who used to live down the street 15 years ago but he didn't seem to notice any muck or wall marks - he was pretty much counting bedrooms (when he wasn't talking) and that sort of thing. Uh, I guess it depends on the company and the representative.
posted by b33j at 6:12 PM on January 19, 2009

We had an appraiser out in... I want to say September or October? Anyway, I neurotically cleaned probably because it was our first appraisal. I scrubbed bathrooms and vacuumed and mopped and touched up paint on door/wall trim that was scuffed.

Even though he came into the house, took pictures, did a tour inside and out and we gave him a comprehensive list of improvements and upgrades, the report he gave back to the mortgage company was largely based on comps. I don't think he even did a good job with the comps either (either bathrooms, bedrooms or square footage on all the comps were off) when he could have comped the exact same townhouse from last year. Comp came in low, we're probably 5% under water on the house as it stands. Long story short, we're not refinancing or selling for a while. Such is life, right?
posted by jerseygirl at 6:31 PM on January 19, 2009

What's a 'comp'?
posted by pompomtom at 6:56 PM on January 19, 2009

A comp is a comparable. Meaning houses that are similar (area, size, bedrooms, bathrooms, etc.) that can be used to value the house that is being appraised.
posted by thenuts at 7:00 PM on January 19, 2009

Often they don't even come in the house. Some don't even get out of the car.
I wouldn't make it look like you don't take care of the place, but I wouldn't stress it either.
posted by JuiceBoxHero at 7:50 PM on January 19, 2009

I've only had one appraisal done, and he didn't bother to come into the house at all. If your appraiser comes inside, he/she will be looking at number of bedrooms/baths, possibly if there are obvious signs of unpermitted work, or work not up to code, or (I'm stretching it here) whether it looks like the house is up to date or last remodeled in 1955. They really don't care about dust and clutter - unless you are one of those mentally ill collector people where you can't see the floor ;)

I vote for not bothering with cleaning, other than a quick tidy up of the most obvious things.
posted by Joh at 9:29 PM on January 19, 2009

I am looking into having an appraisal done as well. A coworker had one done recently (in NJ) and said that this prompted a rise in his property taxes. His taxes are now based on this most recently appraised value. Does this often happen? Is there a way to know if it will happen?
posted by orme at 4:24 AM on January 20, 2009

It didn't happen to us, in MA, but then again we're probably assessed a little too high by the town as is, so you can bet they aren't going to lower their assessment and my tax bill.

Your best bet is asking the assessor's office at your local town or city hall, orme.
posted by jerseygirl at 4:47 AM on January 20, 2009

in residential appraisal, comparable sales are everything. There are many things that factor into the definition of "comparable", though -- the date of the sale, macro market trends, the condition and features of the property, location, and so on. Even if the exact same model sold just last year, it may not be a good comp because the market last year was so different. Appraisers choose the best comps they can find, perform a series of adjustments to account for differences between the comps and the subject property (as much as possible) and come to a reconciled value based on a weighted average of these variables. It's not scientific, but neither is it a blue-sky guess. The appraiser's experience and knowledge of the market are inputs as well.

Halogen, it's possible that your appraiser balked because he didn't have an appropriate adjustment worked out for "subject property is missing finish floor in two bedrooms." It's difficult to quantify the effect this has on the value of the home, and I don't just mean the cost of installing new floors.

To answer OP's question, cleanliness is not a factor except insofar as it contributes to or degrades the appraiser's subconscious evaluation of the property's general condition and level of upkeep. There is actually a standard form for residential appraisals, and there is no box to check for "current owner is a slob."
posted by Chris4d at 10:54 AM on January 20, 2009

Over the last 8 years, I've had 3-4 appraisals done - we cleaned like mad for the first couple, but then I blatantly asked an appraiser and he told me that unless it is visual damage (water damage, mold) that we shouldn't worry.
posted by jkaczor at 4:53 PM on January 20, 2009