Dustin Miller

Hey Serentiy,

Very good question and it's nice to see you didn't just accept the appraiser's value as gospel. There is a difference between appraisal value and market value no matter what some appraisers will tell you. This doesn't mean that all appraisals are wrong, but it means that markets change sometimes weekly and uless you are in them (as a realtor or actively looking for a home) using past sales can be misleading.

I can't say I know your area (Im in the Coral Springs / Coconut Creek , FL area) but I know how markets are here and last year we had the same issue. Appraisals came in higher than we could reasonably expect to sell homes for which gave the seller/homeowner the idea that their agent was not working hard because no one would pay the amount of the appraised value. This was because the market was changing and prices were dropping at the time, but there was not much "data" to support that during the transition.

With that said your home may be "appraised" at $129,000 based on sales that happened 4 months ago, but if no other homes have been selling since then at that price and other sellers are lowering their prices to compete that will certainly affect the "market value" of the home since buyers generally want to pay less for similar homes in their area. Make sense?

Also the appraiser tend to be more generous with value when it comes to a refinance vs a sale so that might also have something to do with it... - Sat Jul 11 2009, 10:42