Randolph Kinney's Q&A

Where are you located?California has a procedure to request the county assessor to revaluate your home's value.Different states have different procedures to appeal your assessed value.

Appraisers use the direct sales comparison approach using the most similar, the most recent and most proximate sales to your home's attributes and amenities to determine market value.If you get with a Realtor that specializes in your neighborhood, they can give you an idea of the market value or what your home could appraise for.Or, if you have a "cookie cutter" home, that is to say you live in a neighborhood that has many homes that were all built in a similar year, floor plans and amenities, websites like Zillow can be useful.Today's market has many areas that are full of distressed sales.  These affect value.  Having said that, regular sales are preferable and should be given more weight for value determination than distressed sales, all things being equal.

Contracts to purchase a short sale property are contigent on the bank's approval to agree with the terms, conditions and price of the offer.  That is the bank that is holding the current first mortgage and any additional lien holders on the property that will be affected.The new lender for the buyer and the old lender for the seller are interested in current "market value".  The purpose of the appraisal will be to determine market value for a mortgage finance transaction.  Market value is defined by Fannie Mae.The the most recent, most proximate, most similar properties are the comparable properties that will be used to determine market value, after adjustments.If the bank who holds the mortgage agreed to your terms, conditions and price before the appraisal, they are duty bound to support that.Your lender may not agree with the opinion of value expressed by the appraisal they ordered.  They may find fault with it and order a new appraisal or they could just cut the value they will loan on.