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Any Suggestions On How To Find A Mentor?

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WillWorkForTraining said:
Thanks for the honesty bnm. However, you misunderstand my intentions here. I in no way think it’s going to be easy. I have a side investment that is making more and more money and requires less and less of my time as I go. Eventually, it will be purely passive income, which is great and I’m very lucky in that regard. However, I’m only 43. I’m going to need something challenging to keep me going and maybe make some money as well. I think appraisal fits for me perfectly.

I think my point about part time was in reference to the volume, not the level of effort. In other words, I’m not going to press for large amounts of volume mostly because I won’t have to. Doesn’t mean I think it’s going to be simple.

One thing I’ve learned is that self employment careers that can be stressfull when it’s a sole income can be much more rewarding when you don’t necessarily have to push your volume to pay your bills.

From that perspective, why couldn’t it be a part time career? Appreciate your thoughts here...
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I haven't made my way through the entire thread yet. But honestly, I think you will have a very difficult time finding a mentor that wants to take on a low volume trainee. Your background shows that you are reasonably intelligent, but you don't know what you don't know. If I said I was going to retire tomorrow and part time it in corporate finance, I would be laughed out of the building.
 
WillWorkForTraining said:
Well my point is that training and learning is a curve not an absolute. If what you are saying is that if you put a trainee with 100 hours right next to an equally talented trainee with zero hours and right next to an equally talented trainee with 500 hours and you would expect the same quality of work with no difference in speed, efficiency or accuracy between the three, while I fully respect your opinion I find it incredibly difficult to believe. My point is that trainee value should increase over the period (otherwise the hours requirement aren’t accurate). As a trainer you should expect that and push for that so that you can (among other things) get some value for your time.

My point about the assistant trainee thing, is to appoint them sort of as an admin to learn the skill set from the trainee toward the end. Not necessarily to create reports or anything like that. It’s a practice position that the trainee can begin grooming so that the next trainee isn’t completely green.

At any rate my surprise regarding this community is two fold really. Glad to see so many opinions (I’m never offended), and you are the experts in the field so I’m soaking up everything I can and I greatly appreciate it. On the flip side, I think the perspective of seeing trainees as liabilities and a general perspective as a waste of your time, well I just think that’s quite short sighted and the general unwillingness to give back to a profession that you have benefited from is surprising. Maybe my top of mind examples don’t work in the real world, but they were just examples.

The idea that there must be some way to turn the fact that you get cheap labor into an advantage for you and hours for us should be important to the profession.
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Trainees are not cheap labor...it costs me at least $100,000 to train someone properly. It will take me years to make it back.
 
So I skipped some pages. I'm not a residential appraiser and I don't know why anyone would want to become a residential appraiser right now. The residential guys have been squeezed so much that I don't know of many that could possibly afford to train someone. Again, you seem like an intelligent person, but your potential career path is going to be much more difficult than you imagine.
 
WillWorkForTraining said:
And I’ll say this once again: Don’t be so sure what I can or cannot do, I haven’t started yet.
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<Sigh>

I have been a moderator on this site for well over a decade and I have seem people like you with similar attitudes many times. They didn't take on your opinions but they were just as creative.

First of all, you cannot do anything legally against a bunch of self-employed business people across the country in regards to price fixing and you cannot change the system that has been in place for many years. It is not FINANCIALLY FEASIBLE for most to train anyone as the fees are simply not there in the residential world and especially California.

If the residential appraisal business was so good to get into why are the numbers shrinking (it isn't age, it is fees and working with AMCs that are pushing people out)? If it was such a good business why aren't appraisers training their kids to become appraisers? Parents teaching their kids the family business used to be very common but it is not longer common. I have two grown children and did not even consider training them to do what I do. I have two younger adopted children and would not think of training them to come into the profession unless they were going to get a commercial license.

People in my market are working for as little as $275/report while my average fee is around $500-$600 for residential. Why would I train someone to work in my market and teach them the things I know so that in two years they can compete with me for the clients I work with that pay me those fees? You cite limiting competition and PRICE FIXING yet there is no price fixing in my market, people are working for fees from $275-$500. Where is the price fixing?

A vast majority of appraisers in the residential world work from their homes and many commercial appraisers too. I don't want you coming into my home for a couple years and disrupting my lifestyle and how I work, when I work and what I choose to do that day.

The average residential appraiser makes only about $65,000/year. They don't have the ability to train someone given the economics. For those of us that make over $100,000 or more we don't want to take on the liability of hiring an EMPLOYEE as that is what we are required to do if we take on a trainee. I would have to pay you, and take out taxes and follow all applicable labor laws in order to hire a trainee who will COST me money for the first year...........

Let me consult with my wife on that......."Darling, I an going to hire a trainee who will be coming to our house daily to help me and I will have to increase what I pay to the accountant and he will cost me money for awhile so I will make less money for awhile so can you put off buying that car you want for awhile?"....."Oh and in two to three years I will have taught him how to do legal work, farm work, specialty work and all that other work that allows me to charge higher fees and he will become my competition."...........Yeah, that would go over well with my wife of 29 years.

I do applaud you for this thread, it was entertaining and typical of someone who thinks they know everything without one day of experience.
 
WillWorkForTraining said:
Oh good. Glad you are used to it, it helps so you can’t claim ignorance when the time comes.
Perhaps you haven’t run across anybody with both motivation and resources. I may be a “rookie” in appraisal, but not in many other ways. Who knows maybe what you are all doing is completely legal, but I intend to find out. ...
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Mr. Hatch has more experience than you have in your pinky toe. Your attitude is horrible.
 
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WillWorkForTraining said:
Fewer clients = fewer hours no? Don’t see why I couldn’t take half the clients that you are and then thus put the same amount of quality and effort and have that be half the hours....

Thought you guys would be good at logic, what am I missing here?
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no.

if they get busy you get busy. trying to guess how many hours you are going to work is not going to work if you want to service your clients well.
 
Digger88 said:
no.

if they get busy you get busy. trying to guess how many hours you are going to work is not going to work if you want to service your clients well.
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And you need to have an amazing spouse to understand that one week you might work 90 hours and the next you might work 30 hours.
 
bnmappraisal,

You raise a remarkable point. The difficulty in my own search for a mentor has been the ominous feeling that I have to get past the filter of being looked at as someone who is simply looking for something else to do outside of my own field of expertise. But then again, it wasn't far from the truth when I got started. It's taken awhile to actually see past my own filter of expectation, of looking for something else to do and dedicating a lot more time to researching and developing a vision for the ideal situation I want to work toward as an appraiser. Anyway, still working on it
 
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