Anyone interested in appraisal forms in Excel?

[George Hatch]

FWIW, there is a tool in Apex Medina that lets you drag and drop the sketch form into a spreadsheet. Alternately, you can drag and drop just the sketch "panel" and the individual calculations to a cell or just export the calculations as an generic XLS.

Wow, live and learn. That works quite nicely and it doesn't blow the file size up like a .bmp does. Thanks for the tip. Now if only I could figure out how to drop pdfs directly into Excel without doing the copy-paste routine, I'd be set.

 

[Randall Garrett]

George,

In Apex Medina, you use Export > Data on the file menu. When you select that function, Apex Medina automatically minimizes to the task bar and a translucent dialog comes up. This dialog essentially contains all the data from the Area Calculations Summary in a "grid" component as well as a graphic showing the sketch on the current "form." There is a drop list there where you can select from different formats, including "Sketch Only." So you can simply drag a pre-formatted sketch & calculations to the spreadsheet or drag and drop individual "elements" - data (square footage, and/or associated label), sketch image, etc.

Hopefully, the quick screen shots below will help. If not, give me a shout and we can walk you thorough it. Designing your own sketch addendum should be a snap compared to an appraisal form...

-Randall Garrett-
..Apex Software..

/end/

 

[Randall Garrett]

George,

It has been a while since I looked at this and in using this in the latest build, I see where it can be improved with just some minor tweaks. If you'll use it some and give me your thoughts, I'll try to comprehend your wish list as best I can and add them to the list for the next update if it will help you in your efforts.

I also noted that our Export to XLS is pretty raw and contains a lot less data than it used to from several versions back. Give this some thought, too, if you want to think about exporting the data straight to a template or something. If I am going to improve this, using your "model" is as good a place to start as any...

Feel free to send me your thoughts here or via direct email, noted below.

-Randall Garrett-
..Apex Software..

e-mail: rgarrett [at] apexwin [dot] com

 

[George Hatch]

Thanks for the thought. I had tried the export feature and posted just before you did and it seemed to work just fine as is. My diagram came out nice and clear. I didn't attempt to import the calculations, though. That might save a few seconds but I don't think we're at the point yet where it's a big deal one way or the other.

I spent a couple hours this afternoon and here's what I have so far. The front page of the URAR is kind of tedious to clone with a spreadsheet primarily because they didn't lay it out with any sense of symmetry or with an eye toward lining columns up from one section to the next. It's the main reason the Fannie forms look so "busy".

So far, all these checkboxes work and the data fields are formatted for text entry.

 

[Randall Garrett]

Thanks George. Yes, I saw your post - I must have been typing it or making the screen shots when you sent it... I am pretty slow on the keyboard, LOL.

I noted some deficiencies in the implementation of the grid control - can't multi-select or group items before dragging, etc. Thought that might be handy, but it might be faster and more seamless if I tailored the XLS output around someones needs - say, yours. In my mind, this is really no different than me tailoring our lower-level integration behavior for a traditional forms vendor. I don't charge for this, LOL - my only goal is to deliver what people want... I just don't know how best to format the data.

So, if this might be of interest, take a look at your needs and let me know how you think you might want to see the sketch data (pertinent items - calcs & sketch image) formatted for the XLS Export and I'll see about getting it to work better than it does now so that you (or the user) might approach the convenience seen with our regular integration with the traditional forms programs but still retain the flexibility of using Excel as the "forms engine." I'd like to support your efforts in any way I can. If things work well enough for now, that is great, but if you'd like to see some improvements, let me know. That is the only way I'll know what to do... ;-)

-Randall Garrett-
..Apex Software..

/end/

 

[Couch Potato]

Thanks for the thought. I had tried the export feature and posted just before you did and it seemed to work just fine as is. My diagram came out nice and clear. I didn't attempt to import the calculations, though. That might save a few seconds but I don't think we're at the point yet where it's a big deal one way or the other.

I spent a couple hours this afternoon and here's what I have so far. The front page of the URAR is kind of tedious to clone with a spreadsheet primarily because they didn't lay it out with any sense of symmetry or with an eye toward lining columns up from one section to the next. It's the main reason the Fannie forms look so "busy".

So far, all these checkboxes work and the data fields are formatted for text entry.

Keep in mind, only the order and complete content is important for Fannie compliance as a "1004." The exact layout and size does not have to match the PDF they publish.

 

[George Hatch]

Keep in mind, only the order and complete content is important for Fannie compliance as a "1004." The exact layout and size does not have to match the PDF they publish.

Point taken. The problem is how to stuff all the info and checkboxes into the limited amount of space. For instance, the checkbox grids for the neighborhood factors, site factors and improvements factors could have just been done with 1-liners rather than multiple choice checkboxes. The same holds for occupancy, property rights appraised and assignment type in the I.D. section. That would have reduced the number of necessary columns, possibly by half, and the form would have looked a lot cleaner.

But it also would have taken a little more effort to fill out and it would be harder to scan with a machine.

 

[George Hatch]

To all,

Having put up a sample of what we can do with it, I want to see if there's enough interest to justify following through and finishing the form. Really, just the one form wouldn't be enough for most users, and quite frankly, I don't have the time to build 2 complete sets of forms - Fannie and non-Fannie. At least a few other people would have to participate, and as I envision it there won't be any money involved for anyone.

"Someone" is going to have to be willing to step up and donate some time and effort, rather than money, toward the common good. Hopefully there will be several "someones", and ideally, many "someones".

If we build it I'd like to just post it up as a freebie download or pass it back and forth via email (the file sizes for the forms are extremely small). I really like the idea of people power. Maybe some appraiser who is just scraping by might be able to take advantage of it as a temporary stopgap solution. Maybe some spreadsheet wonk will be able to add enough refinements to make this the go-to solution for certain types of assignments. Maybe we'll come up with some innovation that might appeal to the users of the bigger/better appraisalware packages and lead to refinements for those packages too. I can really see some possibilities with importing data from multiple sources and integrating them into an autopopulate function, not to mention the statistical analyses functions.


But there is some work involved and it can get a little tedious. I don't mind contributing some time and effort to the cause but I'm in no position to carry the entire load myself.

 

[Louis Pompeo]

George:

Are you selling the URAR form?

 

[George Opelka]

I was talking to John Cirincione about the technical evolution of the URAR at the Valuation Expo in Las Vegas last week. If you don't know John, he's an appraiser out of Ohio and a great guy to sit down and talk to about technology as he's seen a lot over the years. This spreadsheet post brought me back 25+ years and I thought some of you may find this interesting. There's a lot more to the story but below is the Reader's Digest version.

The URAR prototype was developed in Chicago back in the early 1980s by an MAI using VisiCalc - the first spreadsheet application for PCs. As the appraiser wrestled with the form over time, he would print it out and drive/fax it around the lake to Stevensville, Michigan to Richard Heyn, SRA who had a booming appraisal software company. Rich would have his programmers code up the form in order to render a more professional printout to present to Fannie Mae for consideration.

The "great debate" with Fannie Mae as to the contents and the layout of the form (and even the name) went on for quite some time. Mark Simpson was at Fannie Mae back then and was instrumental to the forms development as well. As time passed on and after several iterations, modifications, numerous debates with Fannie, etc...the forms were eventually moved over to Lotus 1-2-3 (only because the MAI upgraded his software). I believe the files eventually made it over to Excel just to prove a point.

I can't say for certain but, I believe those files are on several disks in the back of a dust filled drawer. I've got a direct line to the "Grandfather of the URAR" as Mark Simpson once referred to him -- he happens to be my father -- F. Gregory Opelka MAI, SRA. Like many of you, I was born into this crazy but great industry! I'm going to have to put in a call today before the Bears-Packers showdown and see if the files are still around. It would be interesting to track those down and fire 'em up!

As for Mr. Visicalc, he's 80 years young now, retired, and doing OK. Back in the day, he was active with the Society of Real Estate Appraisers, Appraisal Institute, America's Community Bankers and he was an appraisal instructor/mentor to many appraisers like John Cirincione, Rich Heyn and Wayne Pugh to name a few. He and my mother "Duckie" have 9 children, a small village of grand children, and lot of fond memories.

Thanks for letting me share the story.

George Opelka, ACI