Real estate appraisal

Real estate appraisal, home appraisal, property valuation or land valuation is the process of assessing the value of real property (usually market value). The appraisal is conducted by a licensed appraiser. Real estate transactions often require appraisals to ensure fairness, accuracy, and financial security for all parties involved.

Appraisal reports form the basis for mortgage loans, settling estates and divorces, taxation, etc. Sometimes an appraisal report is also used to establish a sale price for a property. Factors like size of the property, condition, age, and location play a key role in the valuation.

Appraisals are often required by lenders for issuing or refinancing a loan. In such cases, when the borrower asks the lender for a loan or a refinance, the lender will order an appraisal. Once ordered, the borrower will have to schedule an appointment with the appraiser for the in-home visit.

The appraiser will visit the property, assess it, gather data and leave. This usually takes a few hours, depending on the size of the property. After the on-site visit, the appraiser will spend time researching and preparing an appraisal report. The appraiser will provide the completed report to the lender within a couple business days. The borrower may also obtain the report upon request.

On average, the entire process of obtaining an appraisal takes from 5 to 15 days.

There are several types and definitions of value sought by a real estate appraisal. Some of the most common are:

There can be differences between what the property is worth (market value) and what it cost to buy it (price). A price paid might not represent that property's market value. Sometimes, special considerations may have been present, such as a special relationship between the buyer and the seller where one party had control or significant influence over the other party. In other cases, the transaction may have been just one of several properties sold or traded between two parties. In such cases, the price paid for any particular piece is not its market "value" (with the idea usually being, though, that all the pieces and prices add up to the market value of all the parts) but rather its market "price".

At other times, a buyer may willingly pay a premium price, above the generally accepted market value, if his subjective valuation of the property (its investment value for him) was higher than the market value. One specific example of this is an owner of a neighboring property who, by combining his property with the subject property (assemblage), could obtain economies-of-scale and added value (plottage value). Similar situations sometimes happen in corporate finance. For example, this can occur when a merger or acquisition happens at a price which is higher than the value represented by the price of the underlying stock. The usual explanation for these types of mergers and acquisitions is that "the sum is greater than its parts", since full ownership of a company provides full control of it. This is something that purchasers will sometimes pay a high price for. This situation can happen in real estate purchases too.