Racial Bias Claims Without Proof or Logic

[J Grant]

The one where 40% of Americans want to re-elect an obvious white supremacist as President.

I'm sure that vast majority of appraisers take the USPAP ethics seriously, but it would be naive to think there are not racists in this profession who don't and decide to stick it to Black people when they can.

I am a Biden supporter to clear the air, but I highly doubt an appraiser, even they hold white nationalist views, would try to stick it to a black person in an appraisal. If an individual is doing that, they should be booted out of the profession. However, I can't envision it in any widespread basis, if for no other reason than an appraiser knows they could lose license for it

Imo the real problem might be that in some minority communities of a subject location, if there are property maintenance or location issues affecting, that leads to depressed housing values and if an appraiser uses comps from the community the lower price reflects that. The same would be true of any depressed value predominantly white community. Whose owners also b**ch about the value....as do all owners rich or poor when it is lower than they think --

 

[Evincere]

I think it's naive to think that there are not white appraisers who intentionally value the property of Black homeowners lower than they would white homeowners.

That said, I highly doubt it's as prevalent as Brookings claims.

The devaluation of assets in Black neighborhoods | Brookings

Owner-occupied homes in Black neighborhoods are undervalued by $48,000 per home on average, amounting to $156 billion in cumulative losses.

www.brookings.edu

An Appraiser truly using appropriate comparable sales within the subjects defined market area Would have to go to great lengths to determine What the ethnic backgrounds were of sellers of comparable sales. Otherwise, bricks and mortar are neither black, white, Hispanic or Asian.

many neighborhoods are dominated by racial demographics- if using comps from within that neighborhood Brookings needs to prove beyond a reasonable doubt their claims are valid

 

[George Hatch]

It should be a very simple exercise for one of the big box lenders that's doing a lot of deals in an impacted area to select appraisals from those areas and review them, and then compare those appraisals against other appraisals in other areas that were performed by the same appraiser. Then it will become obvious if that appraiser is demonstrating a pattern of conduct where they're acting one way in some assignments and otherwise in all the rest of their work.

In other words, qualify the data (appraisals) that we're comparing instead of just throwing more unqualified data and backfilling the results with a bunch of unfounded assumptions that way the AVMs do.

 

[glenn walker]

I am a Biden supporter to clear the air, but I highly doubt an appraiser, even they are a Trump supporter/ hold similar views, would try to stick it to a black person in an appraisal. If an individual appraiser is doing that, they should be booted out of the profession. However, I just can't envision it on any deliberate or widespread basis, if for no other reason than an appraiser knows they could lose license for it

Imo the real problem might be that in some minority communities of a subject location, if there are property maintenance or location issues affecting, that leads to depressed housing values and if an appraiser uses comps from the community the lower price reflects that. The same would be true of any depressed value predominantly white community. Whose owners also b**ch about the value too...

It's mostly about crime and murder rates, and some places are just to dangerous to live in.

 

[Carnivore]

An Appraiser truly using appropriate comparable sales within the subjects defined market area Would have to go to great lengths to determine What the ethnic backgrounds were of sellers of comparable sales. Otherwise, bricks and mortar are neither black, white, Hispanic or Asian.

many neighborhoods are dominated by racial demographics- if using comps from within that neighborhood Brookings needs to prove beyond a reasonable doubt their claims are valid

Well one clue to someone who has that agenda are Census Tracts. They are very revealing. But i can't see how it would make any difference because the tracts can be relatively small. For my house I would not limit my comparable to this singular Tract. It has to do with the Market Segment Boundaries for my house.

Just type in your own home address and you will see what I mean. https://geomap.ffiec.gov/FFIECGeocMap/GeocodeMap1.aspx

Mine is attached - Something I noticed looking at many of these tracts over the past year, the data seems to change even though we only have the Census every 10 years. I have noticed this in past years.

I may have said in this thread or another but we do have Racist or Discriminatory behaviour in the Real Estate Industry. I can actually prove that... It takes some real effort/research but it can be done. The Annual FNMA Seminar (for employees and contractors), I just completed last month explained it. You have to be someone like us appraisers to find it ! We know how to research Real Property data. Let me say this again, it is not easy at all to find it. It also has nothing to do with Real Property Appraisers. Real Estate Agents are very vulnerable to this and THEY KNOW IT! Its called "Disparate Treatment" This comes in many forms. Example of an RE Agent who treats people differently because of race, creed or what ever is without qualifying the buyer who happens to be a minority takes this buyer to neighborhoods that are predominately of the same minority. This is in spite of the Buyers ability to Buy(price range). Even when there are communities that are predominately white in the same price range, the agent take the buyer to a minority neighborhood in the same price range. That is disparate treatment.

You and I are being accused of the same thing. Here is the problem with that accusation of Disparate Treatment specifically directed at Appraisers. Without saying so, I will leave that to any of you to answer. I already know what your answers will be. Question; How would we purposely treat someone differently(Disparate Treatment) by under-valuating their home?

George already commented to it above my post as I was typing. It will show up like a sore Thumb.

 

[George Hatch]

Find them and burn them out. However many or few.

 

[George Hatch]

My point was and is that if the variable of effect on these cases is the appraiser then the way we identify that's actually what is happening is with the matched pair (so to speak) showing the appraiser is doing one thing in some neighborhoods or with some borrowers and is doing something different with other neighborhoods and borrowers. If a pattern of that misconduct from multiple appraisers emerges then that gives us something specific to work on.

Using the contract price as the benchmark and speculating to the cause requires making assumptions about those contract prices that may be true, or may not be true.

I think comparing properties that have similar ratings for quality and condition will be an even more similar comparison. If we can show an appraiser or a group of appraisers or all appraisers are doing one thing with C4s in one type of area and something different with C4s in another type of area then we've identified a problem with enough specificity that we can address that problem directly. If they're handling near misses with contract prices differently in an area that's been showing rapid pricing increases than in areas with more stable pricing trends then that might actually make some sense.

We cannot know until we look. Predetermined judgements (in either direction) notwithstanding. The conclusion is supposed to come after the analysis, not in lieu of it.

 

[glenn walker]

I dont know anyone who takes a census anymore , get off my porch and be gone : ) LMAO

 

[glenn walker]

Find them and burn them out. However many or few.

George you go- find them in your white as rice community ! GO BOY

 

[TMG]

Proof and logic is soooo 1990s.