Ed, we are responding... you described exactly what Pocket TOTAL does and how we built it. We have hundreds of appraisers as part of our beta test panel, and they helped us make it exactly what appraisers need (and I'm a former appraiser too).
There are dropdowns for all fields. You can customize the system so only certain fields are required, not the whole form (we call them "critical fields"). You can design your own completely custom "data gathering form" if you don't want to use something like the URAR or any other traditional form. Pocket TOTAL doesn't massage the data; it gathers it.
You can talk into the device and store voice notes, or even record the homeowner speaking, and they get stored in the appraisal report's Workfile, so you can listen to them when you get back and are at the desktop.
Pocket Apex can do the whole sketch, but you still "clean it up" on the desktop. And even if you don't want to use Pocket Apex at all, we have a freehand drawing PowerView inside Pocket TOTAL called the FieldPad, which works just like a pencil and your clipboard -- so you can scribble and draw like you want on your clipboard now.
Once you're done in the field, it can either be synchronized with a laptop on the road as you suggest and completed that way, or it can be transmitted back to the office and synchronized via EDI. If you have an assistant at the office, they can work on it too. Even if you wait until you come back to the office, it will intelligently merge any work you've done on the report with anything they've done to it while you were gone (pre-selected comps, addenda, etc.).
It's incredibly flexible and will do what you suggest.
It's not $1000... it's $199. And ACI can start using it immediately if they'll choose to do so.
Dave
