Took the Certified Residential Exam a 3rd time yesterday...

[TerryRohrer]

With all due respect, passing the test IS the point of this thread. Our friend who started it isn't concerned about debating "how many comparable sales can be regressed to the head of a pin", but is concerned about passing the @!$& cert exam, which is not easy. "Teaching passing the test" IS what all good prep courses do - whether you are talking Bar Exam or Appraisal Exam.

My conviction re: Hondros stems from my own experience of taking Bruce Legg's seminar, which uses them. I took the Cert. test 16 years after becoming an appraiser and 9 years after taking the 50 upgrade credits. (By which time I had little memory of the earlier classes and coursework). In addition, my math skills are, shall we say, not the best and leave it at that. Using Hondros I passed the cert. test on the first try. So yes, I will swear by it. The certification test was - BY FAR - the most difficult exam I have ever taken in my life (and I have passed the Bar Exam, which is no joke either).

With all due respect, the purpose of the test is to establish whether or not the test taker has a basic understanding of the very most fundamental aspects of appraisal theory (and frankly, I find that bar so low as to be barely more significant than signing your name). While it doesn't take any understanding of appraisal or valuation methodology to fill out a 1004 report, writing sound, defensible reports on a continuing basis requires a thorough, working understanding of those fundamentals. Anyone relying on Cliff Notes and practice exams and McKissock online classes in lieu of actual education is doing themselves and their future clients a disservice. But, on a brighter note, that is a major asset when the opposing appraiser in any contentious assignment took that route!

 

[Zoe]

You have got to get a grip on the questions you didn't know. You have to remember a few questions where you didn't have a clue. The more practice tests you can take where you have the answers and you get the questions wrong, go back and study those questions over and over and relate the methodology by referencing your appraisal learning material. You can pass it. I know you said you have studied hard. But you need to study more and possibly smarter by focusing on the material you don't know.

 

[Zoe]

You have to pay to take it too don't you? Whatever study habits you have been using, change it. Get more study test and keep the publications from the courses you have taken next to you. Go back and forth on questions that you don't know between your appraisal education materials and the questions you get wrong on practice tests. What does it cost to take the test?

 

[DCD62318]

You have to pay to take it too don't you? Whatever study habits you have been using, change it. Get more study test and keep the publications from the courses you have taken next to you. Go back and forth on questions that you don't know between your appraisal education materials and the questions you get wrong on practice tests. What does it cost to take the test?

It's 75.00 each time you take the test. I've gone to an independent appraiser who has been doing this for 32 years. He gave me The Appraisal Institute "Bible" and the Appraisal Institute Definitions book to study. I've used both of those. I've highlighted material, re-read material, bought exam software with practice problems, and etc. I've had another independent appraiser recommend purchasing a 2 day exam prep cram course to help as well. I've been told by my supervisor that these tests are also "luck of the draw" My fellow coworker took it a 2nd time without even studying. I know this because he went to the beach a week before the exam and he left all study materials on his desk. He passed the second time. He said it was "scary" how similar his test was to the Appraisal Institutes Exam Prep Question book.

 

[KHS445]

One thing I have always found helpful when studying for a multiple choice type test and eliminates some confusion is to take the answer sheet and mark the correct answer for each question. That way when you read a question you will immediately see the correct answer and after some repetitive reading you can burn the correct answer into your brain. Now if you don't understand why a particular answer is correct or how the math works, then you need to spend some more time studying and working your way thru those problems.

 

[Zoe]

It's 75.00 each time you take the test. I've gone to an independent appraiser who has been doing this for 32 years. He gave me The Appraisal Institute "Bible" and the Appraisal Institute Definitions book to study. I've used both of those. I've highlighted material, re-read material, bought exam software with practice problems, and etc. I've had another independent appraiser recommend purchasing a 2 day exam prep cram course to help as well. I've been told by my supervisor that these tests are also "luck of the draw" My fellow coworker took it a 2nd time without even studying. I know this because he went to the beach a week before the exam and he left all study materials on his desk. He passed the second time. He said it was "scary" how similar his test was to the Appraisal Institutes Exam Prep Question book.

Okay, you are getting through the test right? Don't let a question puzzle you too long. Move on and come back to the questions that puzzle you. Skip the ones that you don't know and come back. I know one guy that passed on 3rd time, but he didn't even get through all the questions on 1st two tests.

 

[DCD62318]

Okay, you are getting through the test right? Don't let a question puzzle you too long. Move on and come back to the questions that puzzle you. Skip the ones that you don't know and come back. I know one guy that passed on 3rd time, but he didn't even get through all the questions on 1st two tests.

Yes ma'am. I'm answering all 125 questions. I even go back through a 2nd time and read the questions and answers before completing the exam. I've been told by numerous people to not change answers.

 

[Zoe]

Yes ma'am. I'm answering all 125 questions. I even go back through a 2nd time and read the questions and answers before completing the exam. I've been told by numerous people to not change answers.

I don't believe those people's theory. You either know it or you don't. Make best guess if you don't know it. Some questions can take a long time, but you have to know the methodology to solve them. What do you get to complete exam, 4 hours?

 

[Alsie35]

I don't believe those people's theory. You either know it or you don't. Make best guess if you don't know it. Some questions can take a long time, but you have to know the methodology to solve them. What do you get to complete exam, 4 hours?

The test is 4 hours (I took it in 2018). My strategy was to "reverse engineer" any math question where I was not sure about what order to group the variables in (meaning move them around in the equation) until I got an answer that matched one of the 4 choices. The trickiest thing was in recognizing what part of the fact pattern that they gave you was irrelevant. I don't subscribe to the "go through the test then come back" theory of test taking, and never have. If a question took me 10 minutes to figure out (and there were quite a few that did on the cert exam) I took the time to grind it out til I got one of the 4 choices as the answer. My trick was to note that since it was taking me about 2 hours to do the practice exams, I had plenty of time on the real thing, although the questions took longer, mainly due to longer fact patterns. So I finished comfortably in just under 4 hours. Of course, each of us brings into the test his prior life experience, which in my case was quite varied (and included studying for, and passing, the Bar Exam once upon a time).

I'm not gonna repeat what I said earlier about the best prep material, but I did suggest to the author of the thread that it would be worth his while to fly to CA just to take Bruce Legg's 2-day seminar in January. Hopefully he'll pass this month and won't need to.

 

[Will41]

It's 75.00 each time you take the test. I've gone to an independent appraiser who has been doing this for 32 years. He gave me The Appraisal Institute "Bible" and the Appraisal Institute Definitions book to study. I've used both of those. I've highlighted material, re-read material, bought exam software with practice problems, and etc. I've had another independent appraiser recommend purchasing a 2 day exam prep cram course to help as well. I've been told by my supervisor that these tests are also "luck of the draw" My fellow coworker took it a 2nd time without even studying. I know this because he went to the beach a week before the exam and he left all study materials on his desk. He passed the second time. He said it was "scary" how similar his test was to the Appraisal Institutes Exam Prep Question book.

Don't you have to pay the state fee of $175 plus the $90 testing fee to retake the test?