Refinancing...what to do before appraisal

[eatatmidnight]

I am in a bit of a panic. We are refinancing and our home will be appraised in the next week or so. There are 3 spots in the ceiling that dh is working on patching but I do not know the color of white that was used on it. I don't know what paint to get. Nothing in the house is broken, but it does not look like a model home either. On the outside, I got a lilac bush as a gift and it needs to be planted. It is well landscaped and tidy on the outside. The facia board could use a good painting, but we won't have time to have it done. (That is a job for someone else. The back of our house is 3 stories.) Other than cleaning well, what should be done before an appraisal?

 

[BrettS]

For the most part, the appraisers will look past things that need paint or cleaning and are more interested in large structural problems and the number of bedrooms and bathrooms and square footage and such so that they can compare it with other similar homes.

Depending on what's going on with the holes in the ceiling you might want to make sure that they are patched and painted before the appraiser comes if they look like spots where the roof was leaking or where water leaked down from an upper floor or anything... whether that was the case or not, you wouldn't want him thinking that you had problems like that.

As far as the ceiling goes, if you go to Lowes or Home Depot you can get "Ceiling White" paint, which is reasonably standard (and usually a little cheaper than 'regular' paint). Hopefully that's what was used on your ceilings before (if it's a new house or the ceiling hasn't been painted since it was new, then it's likely that ceiling white is what they used. Worst case you could repaint the whole ceiling, but hopefully it won't come to that.

 

[ccgirl]

I am a realtor. As the PP stated, the appraisers are less concerned with the painting, landscapting and cosmetic things. They are looking to see what the market value would be of the home. For example, if you have remodeled your kitchen/bathroom since the last appraisal that would raise the value. However, if there are cracked windows and broken doors etc, that would decrease the value. They just want to make sure that, should you default, they (the bank) can recoup the mortgage in the current real estate market. Good luck.

 

[eatatmidnight]

Thanks for the information.

The 2 spots in the ceiling came when a foot almost went through from the attic when we were trying to wire a ceiling light. The other is from the origional owners must have had something hanging from the bathroom ceiling because there is a hole about 1/2 inch wide.

The home is in good repair. In the last 5 years we have
-New carpet in LR/DR and stairs
-New hardwood in all other living areas
-All new 6 panel doors
-New HVAC
-New water heater
-All new windows
-New kitchen counters, sink and faucet
-Put in a lanscape
-New roof
-New siding
-New deck
-Finished 75% of the basement. The rest is storage
-Added crown molding and replaced all baseboard
-New kitchen appliances
-New toilets
-Plantation blinds on all windows.

So those are the kinds of things the appraiser will be looking at as opposed to the cleaning and decor of the home? I thought is was supposed to be as if it were on the market...like staged or something.

 

[dawson5]

we just refi'ed back in May, they did a drive-by. From what the loan officer told us the drive-by's were coming in higher than the actual walk-throughs. I don't know how true this is, if this is what they are doing in your area or not. I was on pins & needles, cleaning house it seemed like everyday only to find out that it had already been done. We never received a phone call about the house and things inside (partially-finished basement, new water softener, newer a/c, new garage doors, roof, service entry, etc. --none were taken into account for the appraisal, which came in about $5k less than we thought.) You might just want to ask the loan officer what they are doing, if it's a drive by, just clean up the outside and make sure the lawn is mowed I would think.

 

[MrsSpratt]

The appraisal isn't like the inspection - you don't need to be concerned about "showing" the house - after all, you still want to own it, even if there are a few small holes in the ceiling!

DH and I signed of on our re-fi in July, and the appraisal was, indeed, a drive by. Don't worry and good luck!

 

[eatatmidnight]

Your comments have been very helpful. I e-mailed the loan officer to ask about the appraisal.

Knowing that the house does not have to be like showing it to sell takes a lot of the pressure off.

I always get great info from my buddies at the DisBoards.

 

[disneychrista]

The biggest factor on your apprasial is going to be what compariable houses in your neighborhood have sold for.

 

[kydisneyfans]

I agree with most of the above, we just had a full inside appraisal done for a refi 10 days ago. The biggest factor is comparable home sales in your immediate area. The next factor is any improvements made, and the other thing looked at here was just the overall condition of the property. The comp sale prices in our neighborhood were 162(no fireplace-no fence), 165(short sale due to job transfer), 172. Ours came in at 168.

Our drive by was 160, neither the loan officer nor us were happy with that amount. I have no idea where that number was pulled from, no comp property was that low.

 

[Claire&TheBoys]

Kilz makes a ceiling paint in a spray can that shoots up to repaint over water stains and repairs. It works great. I used it after we had a new roof put on and you can't even see where we had water spots.

 

[dawson5]

I agree with most of the above, we just had a full inside appraisal done for a refi 10 days ago. The biggest factor is comparable home sales in your immediate area. The next factor is any improvements made, and the other thing looked at here was just the overall condition of the property. The comp sale prices in our neighborhood were 162(no fireplace-no fence), 165(short sale due to job transfer), 172. Ours came in at 168.

Our drive by was 160, neither the loan officer nor us were happy with that amount. I have no idea where that number was pulled from, no comp property was that low.

That was our feeling too. We know the drive-by didn't know any of the improvements made that couldn't be seen from the outside. When ours was done, less than six months prior the neighbors across the street sold their home in less than 30 days and got full asking price. Their home is smaller than ours, no finished basement (partial or otherwise), two car garage and older roof. Our appraisal came in almost $20k less than what theirs sold for. Neighbor next to them sold theirs for $10K less than asking (which is more than what it was worth but that's a different story) but it was listed almost $40K more than the other neighbor, bigger home, 3 car garage, finished basement and screened porch on back but everything was original, no updates. We were just glad that we weren't upside down. I guess be happy as long as it covers what you need to get done. It doesn't mean that is what you have to sell your house for if you decide to put it up on the market.

 

[penn19]

Kilz makes a ceiling paint in a spray can that shoots up to repaint over water stains and repairs. It works great. I used it after we had a new roof put on and you can't even see where we had water spots.

Did you patch your ceiling before you sprayed it? We also have water spots on our ceiling and need to get an estimate from a painter, as we figured they would have to patch the spots, and then paint the whole ceiling so it all matched. If I could just spray over it.....

 

[eatatmidnight]

I heard from the appraiser and he will be here for an inside and outside look next Monday. Based upon your replies, that is the better kind to get.

 

[MickeyManiac]

It may also depend on they type of loan you are getting.

We just did a Conventional Re-fi and the appraiser did come in, measure, glance at the bedrooms and bathrooms and take a few pictures of some of our upgrades. He also did some measurements outside. He was much more interested in my car in the garage. He was considering buying one like mine and wanted to know all about it. I was relieved how easy it was. The hardest part was all the work I'd put into cleaning the week before. And considering the market, I was quite pleased with the number he came up with.

Now my MIL is doing an FHA Re-fi and that appraiser did give her a list of repairs that needed to be done before they could schedule a closing. It was easy stuff like painting the outside shed and some trim around her back door. She's had some repairs done in her kitchen and one of the new drywall walls hadn't been painted yet and he said that needs to be done. Still wasn't to hard though.

We hadn't had an appraisal since we'd purchased our home and it's our first house so I had no idea what to expect. I will never fear an appraisal again. Piece of Cake!

 

[Goofygirl17]

We just mailed our re-fi paperwork The appraiser came a few weeks ago. I posted questions on here and got good advice from everyone. He took a picture of every room and the outside of the house. My DH is re-tiling one of the bathrooms and he put that in the report- along with an estimate to finish it (obviously won't cost us anywhere near that much because DH is doing it). He also did comparisons to several similar houses in town. I think the appraisal came out low but that's fine because we got the no-cost refi and will be saving money. We're also staying here for a while so it doesn't matter.

Good luck!

 

[DisTwix]

I am in a bit of a panic. We are refinancing and our home will be appraised in the next week or so. There are 3 spots in the ceiling that dh is working on patching but I do not know the color of white that was used on it. I don't know what paint to get. Nothing in the house is broken, but it does not look like a model home either. On the outside, I got a lilac bush as a gift and it needs to be planted. It is well landscaped and tidy on the outside. The facia board could use a good painting, but we won't have time to have it done. (That is a job for someone else. The back of our house is 3 stories.) Other than cleaning well, what should be done before an appraisal?

Hi there! I had a refi done last year (and again this year - using the same appraisal, woot)... and contrary to what most of the other folks are saying, I absolutely felt that the cleanliness and presentability of my house made a difference.

I live in a "fringe" neighborhood -- there is a HUGE range of house prices, as the houses are at least 40 years old and in various states up updatedness. My house is from the 50s, and I had everything REALLY clean, and super minimal when the appraiser came. She commented several times about the sizes of the rooms, how much SPACE the house felt like it has, in what good repair everything seemed to be --- all of those things were directly because of me putting stuff away, cleaning the heck out of it and putting on that all important surface shine. For me, it absolutely made a difference and was in no way a waste of my time (whether it's supposed to be that way or not.)

Other than that, I would print off that list of improvements you've made and give that to the appraiser - it's information they want to have. I did it, and at the closing, my finance guy was making fun of the fact that my appraisal was the only 4 pager he'd ever seen (I had an extensive list o' things I've done). But! I got $5K above my goal in a down market!

 

[eatatmidnight]

Thanks to all of you for your tips. The house was clean and neat inside and out. It appraised about $35,000 higher than I thought it would. We are thrilled.

 

[Dancemom03]

We had an appraisal done several years ago for a refi. Thank heavens there were no pictures... It was right before Thanksgiving, the height of the Christmas shopping season, and DS31 had just moved back home for a few months until they located a house in the area. As a result DS had boxes stacked against the wall in his room downstairs and I had the ebay inventory that used to be downstairs stacked in rubbermaid bins in my office and bedroom. The appraiser was an older gentleman. He didn't appear to be very sociable. I'll never forget his one and only comment... "So this is what an ebay seller's home looks like, you must make a fortune."

Nope, but sure wish I did! Gosh was I embarassed. Thankfully, the appraisal actually came out nearly $30,000 above what we'd expected when all was said and done but I'll never forget it. We were officially guilty of having excess "ebay clutter"...