Black couple settle lawsuit as home value at $500k below real price

[Fernando]

What is a pole sale? Is that where foundation is post and pier?
While working at the bank, I was told not to make loans on post and pier foundations. I didn't know why. Maybe bank knew something about the dangers of such homes.

 

[shrubberyvaluation]

You can have the best report with extensive detail, but if someone with a financial interest does not like the amount and they are a protected class you can be raked over the coals. It is clear this effect will have more of an influence on advocating for unethical appraisers which is what those in power currently want.

 

[Fernando]

You can have the best report with extensive detail, but if someone with a financial interest does not like the amount and they are a protected class you can be raked over the coals. It is clear this effect will have more of an influence on advocating for unethical appraisers which is what those in power currently want.

Welcome to the world of appraising (and running a business) where we are always watching our backs. Just another issue we have to be aware.

 

[John Hassler]

What is a pole sale? Is that where foundation is post and pier?
While working at the bank, I was told not to make loans on post and pier foundations. I didn't know why. Maybe bank knew something about the dangers of such homes.

As has been mentioned in multiple prior posts regarding this lawsuit, this home has an unusual construction method. Specifically, there is a collection of homes in Marin City, maybe 50-60, on hillside lots that are built on stilts resembling telephone poles. My recollection is that the poles were placed into the ground without concrete. The original buildings are long and narrow, maybe 24’ x 50’ with tandem parking below. My father was an appraiser when these were built and said more than once that the subdivision was a collection of hillside scrap lots developed by a cheap builder (which explains the use of poles in place of a conventional concrete perimeter or slab foundation).

A quick history from memory: Marin City was one of the last areas in the region to be developed. I would attribute this to it having sub par physical attributes. It’s at the shallow end of a bay inlet that is not navigable (by contrast, virtually all of Sausalito bay frontage is). The area was initially developed in WWII with housing to support the thousands of workers building support ships in north Sausalito for the war. The area was effectively abandoned after the war with some apartments built in the early 1960s and the the “pole” homes circa 1970. A large PUD development isolated to the north was built around 1980, and another in the 1990s along with a strip mall.

The views are mostly of the surrounding hills with only slot views of the bay a half mile or more away. The views would be a 2 on a 10 scale for Sausalito (10 being the best). The area abuts a 6 lane freeway and the views are over the freeway ( ie the freeway is below Marin City). By contrast, the freeway is above and behind the views in Sausalito. Marin City has little commercial that is beneficial to locals or cutesy; a 90s strip mall with a few chain restaurants, a Best Buy (shuttered), a West Marine, and a grocery store (these are from memory). By contrast, Sausalito is a world class tourist destination with high end one-off shops and high end dining, and with most housing built 1880-1960.

In short, attempting to compare a home in Marin City to Sausalito would be an act of frustration. Far easier to use older comparable sales in Marin City and spend time developing an adjustment for date of sale.
This is just a quick overview based purely from memory.

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

What is a pole sale? Is that where foundation is post and pier?
While working at the bank, I was told not to make loans on post and pier foundations. I didn't know why. Maybe bank knew something about the dangers of such homes.

In the old days creosote properly hot soaked into wood will last forever. In 1955, a powerline crossed my E 40... I was removed in 1977 by pulling the poles. They were in perfect condition and they left them for me. I sawed them into 8' lengths shy a few inches and being over 60' I was able to get 8 corner posts out of them. Today many are still in the ground and I had to pull one recently when I tore out some fence - perfect condition - 67 years old. I have a shed with a lean-to. The lean to had 3 posts holding up the LTO. The center post rotted. A couple days ago my nephew helped me Jack up the roof back level and put a new CCA or Penta post. The crappy post had rotted in 8 years level with the ground and was slowly eating away at it. After claiming it was a hazard to health - EPA & CA calls it carcinogenic yet, creosote now is considered no more than a skin irritant yet claims it is "probably" carcinogenic. Great science... Railroad ties and power lines can still use creosote though.

If the poles are not creosote then the life of the house is limited to the life of the poles...or else you set them on piers of concrete.

 

[Sadie]

What is a pole sale? Is that where foundation is post and pier?
While working at the bank, I was told not to make loans on post and pier foundations. I didn't know why. Maybe bank knew something about the dangers of such homes.

Deleted

 

[John Hassler]

My guess is that Marin City (MC) is hard to conceptualize for 75% of all appraiser as they haven't experienced this type of neighborhood or market area. Southern Marin County is area that has TMM (Too Much Money); you are not buying here just to put a roof over your head but rather for a lifestyle.

The picture below is an aerial looking south. MC is to the right of the freeway and the majority of the area shown is the shopping center and attached housing built in the 1990s. The 6-8 long buildings behind the attached housing are 1960s apartments. Not pictured but off to the right of the baseball diamond is the area where the Tate property is located. I believe most/all of the WWII housing in MC was raised long ago. There have been 2 detached home (MLS) sales in MC, both noted in my prior post, $1.25m (4-3.5, 2,272sf, 0.19ac) and $1.3m (3-2, 2,302sf, 0.23ac).

Sausalito is to the left of the freeway and about 2/3s of the northern half can be seen. The skyscrapers in the background is downtown San Francisco with the Bay Bridge and Alcratraz Island to the left. The southern most portion of Sausalito seen in this picture is the Banana Belt, so named because it is almost always drenched in sun while the hillside swail to the north and south are consumed with fog on a regular basis; even for this area of micro climates this is a subset. The buildings on the water in the foreground to the left are houseboats (or arks, or floating homes) and most rests on mud at low tide. Just to the north on the water is Clipper Yacht harbor (the end of the navigable waterway) with the industrial looking building to the right being the remains/conversions of the Marinship shipyard of WWII. There have been 57 detached home (MLS) sales in Sausalito in the past 12 months ranging from $1.426m (1-2.1 bath, 1,354sf, 0.04ac) to $7.5m (4 bed, 3.1 bath, 3,355sf, 0.19ac).

 

[John Hassler]

Here's another aerial picture of Marin City this time looking north. The Tate property and other "pole" built homes are to the left of the baseball diamond, specifically the pocket of multi-colored homes on the lightly tree covered hillside.
Mt. Tamalpais (2,572') is the mountain in the background.

 

[Dublin ohio]

As has been mentioned in multiple prior posts regarding this lawsuit, this home has an unusual construction method. Specifically, there is a collection of homes in Marin City, maybe 50-60, on hillside lots that are built on stilts resembling telephone poles. My recollection is that the poles were placed into the ground without concrete. The original buildings are long and narrow, maybe 24’ x 50’ with tandem parking below. My father was an appraiser when these were built and said more than once that the subdivision was a collection of hillside scrap lots developed by a cheap builder (which explains the use of poles in place of a conventional concrete perimeter or slab foundation).

A quick history from memory: Marin City was one of the last areas in the region to be developed. I would attribute this to it having sub par physical attributes. It’s at the shallow end of a bay inlet that is not navigable (by contrast, virtually all of Sausalito bay frontage is). The area was initially developed in WWII with housing to support the thousands of workers building support ships in north Sausalito for the war. The area was effectively abandoned after the war with some apartments built in the early 1960s and the the “pole” homes circa 1970. A large PUD development isolated to the north was built around 1980, and another in the 1990s along with a strip mall.

The views are mostly of the surrounding hills with only slot views of the bay a half mile or more away. The views would be a 2 on a 10 scale for Sausalito (10 being the best). The area abuts a 6 lane freeway and the views are over the freeway ( ie the freeway is below Marin City). By contrast, the freeway is above and behind the views in Sausalito. Marin City has little commercial that is beneficial to locals or cutesy; a 90s strip mall with a few chain restaurants, a Best Buy (shuttered), a West Marine, and a grocery store (these are from memory). By contrast, Sausalito is a world class tourist destination with high end one-off shops and high end dining, and with most housing built 1880-1960.

In short, attempting to compare a home in Marin City to Sausalito would be an act of frustration. Far easier to use older comparable sales in Marin City and spend time developing an adjustment for date of sale.
This is just a quick overview based purely from memory.

From what I have read and seen. They were actually creosote treated "telephone" poles. But the poles are on the perimeter of the house. They do not support in from below like a post and pier foundation. Most of the high priced "pole" homes that have been shown. Have the poles hidden or well disguised. The Marin city subject still had the poles exposed. At least a definite appeal difference. I agree with using older sales. But if for a GSE. They are going to want at least 3 current sales regardless

 

[RCA]

This exemplifies the weakness of the sales comparison approach as practiced by nearly all appraisers. IF you are lacking in good comps, subjective judgment becomes more important - and that is easily challenged - because it is not logically or mathematically constrained through the traditional URAR/AI approach. ---> This was a property almost cherry-picked for a lawsuit.

Their exterior house design was plain and simple, and the telephone poles IMO ugly. A seemingly (from photos) much nicer house sold at the end of 2121, when home prices were near their highest, for $1.3M.

Yes, we would all like to see the two appraisals - but that will not likely happen. I am sure however, neither could be logically justified beyond a reasonable doubt.

Nonetheless, keep in mind this location is actually nice - I like it. But it does seem to exist in a kind of shadow on the opposite side of busy Hwy 101 from central Sausalito - lacking the views and the local lifestyle, amenities and services of central Sausalito west of Hwy 101 and Marin City.

I couldn't come up with a decent value without an inspection. But if it were nice on the inside, I would guess it would be somewhere in between the two appraised values. Hard to say.

Also, the people involved on the defense side, IMO, lacked competence. But just as important, apparently, very large and well-funded entities were behind the plaintiffs and could have kept the battle going for a long time - and it appeared they were very determined to win the case in order to set a precedent. --- As I said, the current SCA approach used by appraisers lacks a good foundation and can always be challenged if decent comps are lacking.

If the appraisals had been carried out in a very logical and mathematical way, even a well-funded plaintiff would run up against some fairly formidable obstacles. Dropping adjustments into a sales grid without mathematical constraints, based on "experience" is an open invitation to problems.