Rush Fees: First of all, we order every appraisal as a rush, and we eat the rush fee. We do this b/c we have discovered that paying the extra fee to appraisers helps get much higher quality work. In addition, we know how important it is to get an appraisal back quickly to keep a transaction moving ahead, and to close on time (particularly in 15 days).
Ordering Appraisals Immediately: We order purchase appraisals as soon as we receive the contract. B/c we do so before we send out disclosures, we have to eat the entire appraisal fee if a transaction falls apart for any reason (we cannot charge the borrower). But again – we understand the need for speed and are willing to take the risk.
Eating dead deals and rush fees costs us thousands of dollars every month, but it is well worth it b/c we get record turn times, and we can brag about them in blogs :). More importantly, our clients love our lightning fast appraisals!
Appraisal Turn Times Under Four Days: The below table is updated every month by our Appraisal Manager, Beau McGlasson. As you can see, our turn-times were above four days earlier in the year. We found that totally unacceptable, and aggressively revamped our hand-picked appraiser pool to ensure purchase turn-times always remain under four days (from the day we receive the contract, no less). We will have it no other way. We are “famous for fast” after all.
Final Note: Appraisal inspections and especially the reports themselves require far more time and effort than many people realize. We sometimes have people question why we don’t have reports back several hours after an inspection. This is b/c they do not realize that writing up a full report, with all of the required data, can take several hours. And that is on top of the inspection and driving to all the comparable sales. Rush appraisals require a herculean effort on the part of our excellent appraisers and require several hours, if not days in some cases.
Jay Voorhees
Founder/Broker | JVM Lending
(855) 855-4491 | DRE# 1197176, NMLS# 310167
