Including Above Grade Area Into Basement or Below Grade Area

[djd09]

...ansi is so bad they had to make up FAQ's and an exception code

 

[Tom D]

Don't the tax records separate them there. Here, the tax record will say first floor living area, second floor living area, basement area, etc in most counties. Notice the tax office and MLS do not say GLA, they only say "living area." They want more taxes and the agents want to market as bigger homes. It does not change how the appraiser should look at it.

i don't think ben franklin thought about breaking out ever level in my big city, lucky yous right now it's hard enough converting his chain links measurement numbers to proper ansi.
what would ansi look like if we had gone metric, to the closest millimeter. our MLS forces the public record sf inserted, right or wrong.

 

[Tim Hicks (Texas)]

...ansi is so bad they had to make up FAQ's and an exception code

I have been using ANSI for 20+ years. The only thing wrong with it is appraisers are stubborn and resistant to change. Which I find odd because things are always changing in this business.

ANSI is just a measuring tool, you use it just like we use Fannie, Freddie, HUD and VA guidelines as tools, Fannie Mae forms as tools. Many appraisers are tools.

 

[djd09]

i know i know...buy the book take the class

 

[sputnam]

...ansi is so bad they had to make up FAQ's and an exception code

The exception code is not ANSI. It's Fannie. Fannie still requires GLA. ANSI is simply the method that is now Fannie's standard for how to measure and calculate GLA. GLA is and always has been, in short, finished, heated, and above grade. The exception code is Fannie's recognition that there are weird dwellings in the world.

 

[residentialguy]

Serious question here. How often do you include above grade GLA into the Below Grade or Basement area? What could possibly be wrong with doing that? Especially if it makes the adjustment percentages look better.

Whenever the grade is atypical. You can have functioning GLA sitting below grade and you can have a basement functioning area above grade. Appraisers seem to think there is something magical about the grade line... if you shovel some dirt up that around a main level, it becomes basement or if you shovel the dirt from around a basement, it becomes GLA. Appraisers that think this are idiots.

 

[Tom D]

i like the shovel theory.

 

[djd09]

measuring instructions... which no market participants use...woke jokes

 

[J Grant]

I am lucky that I appraise in South Florida, where there are virtually no basements ( in my area ).

But we share a common problem where RE agents will include garages, enclosed porches in SF living area of houses and outdoor patios in the SF of condos. It takes time to separate it out, and can mean having to call a listing agent, or an exterior observation, search old listings, and often public records break out the SF.

We are supposed to adhere to ANSI for lending work regardless of how we feel about it. To report it as SF living area on the grid can be misleading, even if we explain it is because the market views it that way. Valuing an area for how the market vies it and what they pay can ill be done while reporting it to the ANSI specs.

 

[djd09]

...boy have they done a good job brain washing appraisers