At the onset of the new law it was brutal. We were getting appraisers who were unfamiliar with neighborhoods coming in to do appraisals and it was a clusterfck… You cannot always rely on comps on the computer as every neighborhood has inconsistencies that can have dramatic effects on valuations in small geographical areas. Over the past year or two we have seen improvement in this arena and now it seems that the appraisal management companies are at least hiring appraisers who have more experience in the locations that they are performing appraisals in. The “conservative” nature of appraisals is not really in the pricing anymore. The comp wheel has already been grinding forward for a few years now so prices are steadily moving up. What bogs appraisers down now is that the guidelines for the appraisals are tight. That is, you have to have x number of recent sales to support the price conclusion or you must have y number of actives or pendings… In many cases the guidelines cannot be met and exceptions are needed. So the process can be pretty … gummy…

With all this said if anything, it seems to me we are getting closer to the good old days. Appraisals do for the most part now come in at sales price… The bottom line is… housing prices are going up and there is really nothing to stop them except interest rates.