Clearly, surely, there have to be some good examples out there of AVM-"appraised" loans on properties which have floated belly-up by now and are starting to stink up some investors' portfolio somewhere ! ......It may have gone something like this......(Smithers, V.P. of Big Bank Financial Corp.) "So, I hear we have run into a major snag with that Wilson file." (Jones, lowly loan officer trying to do good ) "Yes, Mr. Smithers, it seems Mr. Wilson lost his job at the software engineering company on St. Patrick's Day, he's been drinking ever since, and has stopped paying us on that $500,000 mortgage we gave him in January. (Smithers) "Well, I'm sure it's a nice house, so let's start foreclosure proceedings and sell the place !" (Jones) "Well, you see, we have since learned that it is not so nice, and three local realtors have proposed listing prices for the place between $350K and $375K, max". (Smithers) "Well, maybe I should just "max" that appraiser to the moon, yeah, that's what I'll do, contact our corporate attorney. I'll sue that guy right back to Skid Row." (Jones) "There's another snag, Mr. Smithers, as we did not use an appraiser. Nobody went out and actually looked at the house, either inside or out. You see, we thought we'd save the corporation some money and order one of these new AVM things". (Smithers) "Shall I guess it cost us $345, instead of the usually $350 for a full appraisal inspection and report !" (Jones) "No Sir, we only had to spend $25 and ....you should see it.....nicely printed out in a small binder with clear plastic sleeves to hold the two pages which tell us what the house is worth.....I mean, what we all were hoping it was worth....Oh, Mr. Smithers....you're not mad at me are you ?....I'm still going to get that raise you promised, right ?" (Smithers) "Yeah, you'll still get that raise, don't worry, we'll find a way to get the American taxpayers to cover that one for us.---------A day in the life of Smithers and Jones.
