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3.6 and ACI

F

Fnbpos

Junior Member
Joined
Oct 28, 2003
Professional Status
Certified Residential Appraiser
State
Florida
Been using ACI since 1987 (likely this is before the competition even existed)—don't want to switch at this point. I took the day to try out ACI 3.6. At first run, it could not be any more UN-user-friendly. Has anyone tried this out with a different experience ? The level of redundancy is off the charts—there are numerous entries that are the same for over 95% of all appraisals we complete - yet we can't create a template ? It appears they always need manual input—every field—over and over ? The drop-down menus offer entries we will never use—there should be a way to manually arrange those so the most often used ones appear at the top of the menu. There just couldn't have been many, if any, appraisers on the development team, and if there were, were they appraisers who actually worked completing many appraisals as quickly as possible ? Even the form format cannot be customized—no canned comments allowed ??? There does not appear to be anything considered that would save an appraiser time. Good thing the other software companies are giving out free demo time. What am i missing here? Has anyone tried ACI 3.6 ? There are many more apparent issues than i've listed. I hope i'm wrong here - but initial use was highly disappointing. The cloud-based "solution" is quite a risk to take - the internet went down for an hour due to a storm and i had no access to the appraisal.
 
Fnbpos said:
Been using ACI since 1987 (likely this is before the competition even existed)—don't want to switch at this point. I took the day to try out ACI 3.6. At first run, it could not be any more UN-user-friendly. Has anyone tried this out with a different experience ? The level of redundancy is off the charts—there are numerous entries that are the same for over 95% of all appraisals we complete - yet we can't create a template ? It appears they always need manual input—every field—over and over ? The drop-down menus offer entries we will never use—there should be a way to manually arrange those so the most often used ones appear at the top of the menu. There just couldn't have been many, if any, appraisers on the development team, and if there were, were they appraisers who actually worked completing many appraisals as quickly as possible ? Even the form format cannot be customized—no canned comments allowed ??? There does not appear to be anything considered that would save an appraiser time. Good thing the other software companies are giving out free demo time. What am i missing here? Has anyone tried ACI 3.6 ? There are many more apparent issues than i've listed. I hope i'm wrong here - but initial use was highly disappointing. The cloud-based "solution" is quite a risk to take - the internet went down for an hour due to a storm and i had no access to the appraisal.
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I believe this redancy is a built-in feature of UAD 2.6 that no software can overcome.

In ALAMODE, at least some form of template can be created, yet we STILL will have to manually fill in every checkbox and extra field of data on the cloud-based drop-down menus. I don't believe the braggart tech bros behind the new software can get around it either - they brag about AI pulling comps and the like instead.

Most appraisers, including those who have done one of the UAD3.6 beasts, estimate an additional 2-3 hours on every report.
 
ACI = DOA

I went through their ACTs Conference presentation a year ago. It was obvious to me just from that - that their '3.6 Workbench Cloud attempt" was gonna put them out of business. (Bookmark this comment. ACI will be terminated as an unprofitable line of business by First Am within a couple of years. You read it here first).

Thankfully we will never have to deal with it because on the day that the 1004/2055 regime is retired - so are we.
 
Fnbpos said:
Been using ACI since 1987 (likely this is before the competition even existed)—don't want to switch at this point. I took the day to try out ACI 3.6. At first run, it could not be any more UN-user-friendly. Has anyone tried this out with a different experience ? The level of redundancy is off the charts—there are numerous entries that are the same for over 95% of all appraisals we complete - yet we can't create a template ? It appears they always need manual input—every field—over and over ? The drop-down menus offer entries we will never use—there should be a way to manually arrange those so the most often used ones appear at the top of the menu. There just couldn't have been many, if any, appraisers on the development team, and if there were, were they appraisers who actually worked completing many appraisals as quickly as possible ? Even the form format cannot be customized—no canned comments allowed ??? There does not appear to be anything considered that would save an appraiser time. Good thing the other software companies are giving out free demo time. What am i missing here? Has anyone tried ACI 3.6 ? There are many more apparent issues than i've listed. I hope i'm wrong here - but initial use was highly disappointing. The cloud-based "solution" is quite a risk to take - the internet went down for an hour due to a storm and i had no access to the appraisal.
Click to expand...
The whole time they are calling you an idiot for not embracing change! I sat in on a couple if their webinars and I could not believe their attitude. ACI is sure a piece of work...
 
cashcatz said:
Why not? 3.6 is all new, anyways. It's a great time to look at options. SFREP offers a very generous free period.
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If I was an ACI user I would use SFREP. I was an ACI user a long time ago, and honestly it looks like SFREP is a pretty similar type program. If they had access to a better sketching program, I would consider it. But the mobile app for SFREP is a separate vendor. And I would have to use my IPAD which is very cumbersome and doesn’t have a good camera like my IPHONE. I am still hoping Alamode gets its act together. I think they will. I just like their mobile app too much at this point, and I like using my IPHONE. Plus I use the digital workfile in Total. Do NOT want to go back to paper and pencil and file folders.
 
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