Maybe housing is in a bubble. Some think so. The Dallas Fed was blunt in its assessment: “U.S. house prices are again becoming unhinged from fundamentals.” But their researchers don’t think it would be a repeat of the Great Recession/Housing Crash of 2008.
I recently sponsored a young woman who wanted to be an appraiser trainee. She found me, she knew she wanted to be an appraiser, she had already taken all her classes, and she needed a mentor.
Recently, I have had an “opportunity” to invest a small amount of money in real estate “disruptive technology.” Specifically, it was a startup in residential “I-Buying,” the nickname for instant buying.
The FOMC announces a 0.5% increase on rates to 0.75%-1% for a soft landing. More job offerings than job seekers and wage gains should persist. Lending should increase the rate in borrowings, easing expansion, fueling inflationary pressures
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been working on the redesign of the Uniform Residential Appraisal Report (URAR) for several years. The GSEs, through their Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) and Forms Redesign Initiative working group, have worked closely with stakeholders and allowed their input
In March, the Department of Housing and Urban Development delivered the long-anticipated Action Plan from the Interagency Task Force on Property Appraisal and Valuation Equity (PAVE) to President Joe Biden. The PAVE Action Report targets dismantling racial discrimination and bias in mortgage
It’s been a crazy couple of years since the pandemic outbreak. First everything shut down and immediate thoughts, beyond health and humanity, turned to how appraiser’s were going to do their jobs. We worked through it. Temporary policies were enacted circumventing interior inspections
At the moment, there are so many relevant unknowns regarding the world and its economies, it boggles the mind. The only part that has just been fixed is a playbook for interest rate hikes. Among the many remaining unknowns are supply chain issues, inflation, Covid variants, energy imbalances, geopolitical issues
Infrastructure is the only way to provide a safe and strong and connected built environment to serve all of our constituencies. For the comfort and well-being of our communities, we must focus on the changing environment and the new behaviors and demographics as they evolve, and we observe them.
With the dark days of winter now behind us, springtime is a season for growth and renewal. While the Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Maine Chapter of the Appraisal Institute has its sights optimistically set on the year ahead, we retain an appreciation of the challenges
