Ms. Barbara,
I'll try not to make you regret your posting!
But I do want to touch you as all those licenses are impressive!
You never concluded with just what in the world you do when you are faced with a blatently illegal improvement situation. You almost make me feel like you've never been or have:
- sent out to appraise a single family property and walked into an house illegally converted into a duplex with the second unit hidden in the garage.
- or while at an acreage property zoned for one house discovered a full apartment has been built inside a 40 by 60 metal pole barn.
- or been asked to give value to a manufactured home on a site with a house zoned single family residential when it was the previous owner who was granted the hardship permit for the manufactured house which expired when they sold the house and moved. The permit of course requiring removal of the manufactured home upon expiration.
- or sent to a four-plex that has six units in it with only up to four unit zoning.
- or asked to appraise a single family house whose living room and family rooms have disappeared. With what was a three bedroom house now a twelve bedroom boarding house with five kitchens, but oops... the septic system was designed for a three bedroom occupancy according to permits. Gee, the place has a bad odor.
- walked in and found safety panels off the circuit breaker boxes with new electrical wiring sticking right out the front and tacked up the front of interior walls, suspended over the ceiling, under a doorway, back across walls, down to the floor to muliple wall outlets without even safety boxes laying on the carpet with portable space heaters plugged into them and an extra 220 volt range / oven sitting in the living room all connected. Most the wiring tacked together with electricians tape.
- asked to appraise a manufactured home that has had one of it's outer walls ripped open and a ramshackle stick built addition has been put on it made of inferior quality materials and construction, and it's electrical is tapped into the manufactured home wiring.
- faced with 80 acre minimum zoning in place since 1973 only allowing one (1) residential home to be built on a nonconforming 20 acre site with statue allowing a not more than 800 square foot guest house with no kitchen or laundry factilities. Only you arrive and there is a 3,300 square foot house, a 1,200 square foot guest house with kitchen and laundry, and another 1,800 square foot "Guest House" with kitchen and laundry all built after 1994 by an owner who was a builder. You're supposed to give it all value and you are aware a formal complaint and demand by an adjacent neighbor is all it takes to enforce current zoning.
- worked in a state where it's right on the legally required seller disclosure statement if the seller is aware if ANY work requiring permits has ever been done to the house without permits.... Yes or No. The buyer must legally be given a copy of the disclosure and approve it.
I believe we should all be considered real estate professionals that due to being required to determine highest and best use must properly report correct zoning and understand it's implications. As we are also required to report legal, illegal, and nonconforming use of the land in our expected work product as such real estate professionals.
Many people participating in this thread have made very good points about their area not having zoning or permits. But I feel some of them declaring that those of us who say to check on permits are incorrect were really taking our posts out of context when applying them to their situation. I agree, they don't have the issues. I also feel you are very correct in not making statements something is absolutely illegal when record departments make mistakes. However, based on your post, it sounds like you feel that no appraiser should then either make a legal determination regarding the apparent legality of the land use. But I suspect you've been checking those boxes regarding zoning compliance in the site section of the forms like the rest of us. Right?
If so, hence my personal opinion, that we are real estate professionals who are supposed to be able to do the job without ducking the sticky questions for the clients involved. That we are held to a higher standard. That when something is rotten in Denmark, we are obligated and expected to have the knowlege, skill, and ablity to be able to step forward and say, "Something may be rotten in Denmark", and call for evidence of permits and final inspection by the jurisdictional authority, evidence of variances, and safety inspections by qualified inspectors. Yes, we aren't the experts beyond economic valuation or legal determining authority. But we should know when to call them in when our analysis doesn't allow for value that may not exist, or there are apparent hazards to our client's and intended users security in the loan involved.
Respectfully,
Barry Dayton
h34r: 
