After going in on a Thursday and first sitting with the loan officer and getting our questions answered, running some numbers and then later that day deciding to go through with it (i called and verified that we locked in our loan btw), I emailed him all the supporting documents he needed on Friday morning (W2's, paystubs, etc) and waited around for my welcome packet.
Then on Monday, I got a call from BOFA's home appraisal team wanting to come the next day to appraise our home. I was excited and set up the appointment for the next day. On Monday night we tidied up and cleaned the place (which really didn't take too long i'm glad to say), and we were ready and waiting for them to show up for our 3 pm home appraisal the next day.
At 3:05 pm an older gentleman came into our home with a camera...
and by 3:10 he was gone.
Seriously.
We paid over $400 for an appraisal and the guy spent maybe 5 minutes in our home and that was while introducing himself and me stalling him.
He took a few pictures of our home quickly... and one measurement (just one)... and drew one small pencil shape on his notepad.
At this point since he seemed like he was leaving so I made a point to tell him we had just put in new sliding doors (which he didn't look at) and only after I mentioned our newer deck on the patio did he take a step outside and snap one picture of the floor boards outside since they aren't wood.
When I asked if he had an approximation of value in mind (the loan officer asked me to ask), he said he would give us the highest he could because we had title and granite and most units like this don't have those things... but he wouldn't know until he did the comparable units...
Then he turned around and wandered out.
He maybe spent another minute or so measuring the outside of our front door walk up and then spent some time sitting in his car parked illegally in our complex (I know this because we passed him in our car on the way to go by some stamps). He was parked in the middle of the road, blocking 2 parking spaces...
I just hope our value comes back at $142,000.00 or more. That would allow our loan to be up to $113,600 and still have 20% equity so no PMI payments so we would have the option of rolling in our closing costs. At a bear minimum we need $137,000.00 because that gets us 20% equity but we would have to pay all the closing costs out of pocket.
Anyone else have some funny appraisal stories?
The real time spent doing an appraisal is with the paperwork on their side. He needs to research all comps to make sure he has accurate comparisons. The property inspection is just the tip of the iceberg. Also, $400 is pretty cheap for an appraisal. In my area they can be up to $750.
ReplyDeleteThat's good to know. I spoke with a neighbor friend from church the other day and he said that the guy spent 5 minutes more in my place then his and he has the 2 bedroom model.
DeleteMaybe I should count my blessings and cross my fingers???
Here's to hoping for $140k!!!