I laughed one time when I received a stipulation to "bracket both the adjusted and unadjusted sales price" of my tiny REO subject, along with other some other attributes which I can't recall now. I had to respond with "you obviously haven't even bothered to read my report, just glanced at the grid and fired off these stipulations. Tell you what, have your client purchase the smallest home in this tiny rural town, let it sit vacant long enough for a gang to use it as their clubhouse for about 6 months, and then sell it. At that point in time, we might have something to "bracket your adjusted and unadjusted sales prices with." Never heard another word out of them, and I got paid. FHA has a requirement to explain if you find yourself unable to bracket the GLA, however the GSEs have no such bracketing requirements. Unless it's spelled out in your letter of engagement, simply point to the URAR certification #7 that we sign which states "I have selected and used comparable sales that are locationally, physically and functionally the most similar to the subject property." Nothing about selecting dissimilar comps simply to "bracket something" there. The great Stephen Santora used to counsel on here that "the form survives the guidance", meaning that when somebody reads your report five years from now and you contradicted what the form clearly states, then you have an unforced error which potentially sews confusion and weakens your credibility. The reader shouldn't have to refer to "the selling guide" or some other arcane publication to figure out why you did what you did when the form clearly states something different. An issue I find particularly irritating while following GSE requirements depicting the high/low age and price range of "the neighborhood", which more often than not is clearly incorrect to anyone who knows something about the neighborhood and understands the English language (typically a borrower unhappy with the value).
