How To Become A VA Appraiser?

[Ben Vukicevich SRA]

Geez,,,

I didn't even get the request for the 2 letters from clients....so I guess I'm out of the running.....Oh boy....there goes 29 years of experience down the drain.....


Ben

 

[Mike Garrett RAA]

I am very sorry to hear about your suspension....I would raise holy hell over that one based on what you posted here. Dear Congressman _____________. Ten years and no problems? Give me a break. That totally sucks!

Potential applicants.....beware, unless you do everything exactly as indicated on the application fully expect it to be rejected. From what I have been told, they are being inundated with applications, many from marginally qualified applicants, and are just looking for an excuse to file 13 it.

 

[Michigander]

Yes, I think they are totally inundated. I submitted my application a month ago with 3 letters from appraisers and 3 from attorney clients (I don't have regular mortgage clients), and I haven't heard "boo" from them, and I am a woman-owned business (that is supposed to count for something). Suppose I won't hear from them and won't get on their list; they are just too darn busy. :blink:

 

[Don Clark]

B) Charlotte,

I had just the reverse happen. I had done 2 appraisals for an elderly lady. 1 was a land appraisal so she could subdivide a large parcel, and keep house and the other parcel. Her husband was ill & she needed money. Then, a year later, she asked me to appraise her house, and a condo she was buying as her husband had passed away. I did both, even with the interferrence of a son who lived in Richmond, Virginia, about an hour and a half away.

A month later I got a VA assignment to appraise the same house. I notified the lender as to my prior involvement, and tried to set an appointment through the Realtor. The Realtor refused. Seems like she had listed and sold the property for over $30,000. above what I had appraised it for. I wrote a letter to VA explaining the situation. The regional office, at the request of the owner and agent, had the case reassigned to someone else.

Actually, I agree with them. I am keeping a close eye on what it closes for

Don

 

[Mike Garrett RAA]

These are troubled times for the Valuation section people. Tremendous pressure to open the panel completely while on the other hand staff reductions which will limit the field reviews and inspections.

Still no reason to be unreasonable. Common courtesy should still prevail.

 

[Charlotte Dixon]

Originally posted by Mike Garrett, RAA@Nov 19 2003, 11:53 AM

Still no reason to be unreasonable. Common courtesy should still prevail.

Yes, it should. But when you've got an over-zealous, pompous bull-dog who's been on the job too many years, and always wanted to be a cop, what do you get? Hint: It's another kind of animal with 4 legs.

 

[Paul DelleDonne]

Charlotte,

I can feel your pain. The new operations center in our area tact seems to be more anti-productive
than pro-productive - with the respect to just letting the appraiser do his or her job and not having to "look over our shoulder" when an appraisal order comes thru the fax or mail. What a shock to the entreprenurial system it will be for the newbies.

 

[EDWARD BERRY]

I know some have strong thought about the VA panel.

My advise is you may be the best appraiser in yout County, BUT unless you know the FHA manual forward and backward, you simply are not qualified to "determine MPS's"for VA.

Not that you can't learn but it has taken years and MANY hours in training sessions to know how to apply them.

Please don't approve a house for one of our treasured citizens, the Veteran, that has problems.

Happy Learning-ed

 

[Charlotte Dixon]

Originally posted by EDWARD BERRY@Nov 24 2003, 09:54 AM
My advise is you may be the best appraiser in yout County, BUT unless you know the FHA manual forward and backward, you simply are not qualified to "determine MPS's"for VA.

Happy Learning-ed

Ed,

Our situation here in Delaware doesn't question how well we serve the Veterans. That goes without saying. Our honored Veterans are first and foremost when it comes to serving as a V.A. Fee Panel Member, in my case, many years following that handbook. I live and work 2 miles from the Dover Air Force Base Mortuary and am frequently reminded, by the sounds of the planes rolling in, of our dedicated service people. If you didn't know, all the bodies come to this mortuary. If that doesn't make you red, white and blue, inside and out, and bring a tear or two in the middle of the night, I don't know what will.

We previously were under the respected Philadelphia Regional Office, which has merged, or been transferred to Cleveland. I still am dedicated to serving our Veterans; we just have a personality with which to deal having his own agenda, making it difficult for some of us to provide good service. My job is to serve the Veteran, produce an objective appraisal meeting USPAP requirements, with a 5 day turnaround, so that the Veteran and his/her family does not have to stay too long in billeting or a local motel. That's what I do and what I have done for 10 years. With this move from Philadelphia, my job now also covers making somebody behind a desk in a government office feel important. Whether we've done a good job or not, whether we're red/white & blue or not, whether we got that Veteran out of billeting in 2 days or not, whether we whipped the appraisal out so the Veteran could go to settlement before he's deployed in 6 days, or not. We're done, if we don't "play the game". This previously was known as "serving the Veteran". I truely believe that the Honorable Anthony J. Principi, Secretary of Veterans Affairs will not look favorably upon our attempt to provide good service to our honored Veterans, having our goals slowed and our spirits dampened, just to fan a government employee's ego, under the guise of "service to our veterans".

Ed, I think you have an error in your post. You must mean the V.A. manual, not FHA.

 

[EDWARD BERRY]

YES, thats the way it is in some places.

The FHA manual and VA MPRS are so close that I use it, of course other procedures are much different.

As a matter of fact, I have constructed my descriptions so as to conform to all 3(FHA,VA,CONV).

25 years in helping our service people obtain houses, ed