Appraising A Mobile Home

[G-man]

Received an order to appraise a mobile home yesterday out in a rural area that I cover. The lender wishes this to be done on a 1004 with the 1004c addendum attached. Can this be done? This is a true mobile home, not a manufactured home. I drove by it earlier in the week doing a drive by on the home next door. I noted the FSBO sign out front and uttered the phrase that doomed me, "Man, I pitty the poor fool who'll have to appraise that thing" :redface: . Other than the fact comping the thing will be next to impossible, can this be written up on a URAR? I've done two or three mobiles in my time, but never on a 1004, usually just wrote a small one pager giving my opinion of value. Any suggestions. And no, I can't turn it down. I'm trying to build a good relationship with this bank .

 

[Pamela Crowley (Florida)]

As long as the real property is involved, yes, you can and probably should do it on the 1004. This one is going to be a real monster though. Likely minimal added value for the mobile home. Is it given added value and taxed along with the land? You can do the 1004C, but (without looking at it again) I think that's for 'manufactured' homes, as in built to HUD code.

You might want to inform the bank that this home is pre-HUD code and see what they want to do about that. They will most likely have to keep the loan in house and Fannie will not buy it.

 

[Jo Ann Meyer Stratton]

If it is a true mobile home built prior to June 15, 1976, yes you can use the URAR and the 1004C (the lender will not be able to sell the loan to Fannie Mae!). Look for every tag, insignia, piece of paper with the map of the USA (some older mobile homes did have them, just with slightly different wording), that you can find. Search county/city ownership and assessor's records for any and all information you can find. Asks the home owner all sorts of questions and if you can read any documents they have on the home. Then fill out the 1004C with the information you can find--original year of construction, name of manufacturer, serial number and whatever other number from the different inspection companies that existed prior to June 15, 1976. (or whatever information you can find in county or homeowner's documents) It will be very clear to a reader of the report that the home is not built to HUD building code. Depending on your location it might be easy or difficult to find other pre 1976 homes as comparables. Some parts of the country--it is the other way around--there aren't any recent sales of homes constructed after June 15, 1976! And it doesn't matter if they have upgraded or updated everything--the loan still will not be able to be sold to Fannie Mae because the HUD building code was not in effect at time of original construction.

 

[Rich Heyn]

G-man,

A 1004C on a mobile home seems like a waste of time and money.

As Jo Ann stated, Fannie Mae's eligibility requirements exclude mobile homes.

As Pam indicated, you may wish to have a discussion with the lender prior to your field work. If they do not intend to sell the loan to Fannie Mae, the added expense of a 1004C is not necessary unless they just want it for internal reasons.

Rich Heyn

 

[G-man]

Thanks for the responses. Always helpful to have other, experienced appraisers give their thoughts on difficult problems. As to lenders knowledge of the property, I made it as clear as possible to them that I believed the property to be a pre-1976 mobile home. Can't say for sure without walking throughout, however. I will be definantly taking alot of pictures and writing everything down. Just set the appt. for Tuesday of this week. The woman of the trailer (can't really say house), will be meeting me so I can get all the improvements down so I can write up a good appraisal for what the house, I mean trailer, is worth . I can't wait. :batangel:

 

[Rich Hahn]

good luck GMAN
dont forget about all those ceiling fans and the basketball hoop the built in microwave, the new toilet and new mailbox.

Let us know how it turns out. At the rate values are changing I may find my family of 10 living in a manufactured home. Buy one of these babies at the bottom and you have nothing to loose.