I’m all for a “mandatory fee skim or administrative processing expense cap for AMC’s.” That way their desire for profit would help the industry, rather than cripple it.

The point about appraisers is really an excellent one. According to Jonathan, when he went to set up the AMC, he went to the appraisers first and asked them what they wanted. Result? Lots of very happy appraisers. But I know that’s not common.

Look, if everyone is unhappy, then everyone should be working together to fix things. The LO wants a good appraisal, so he should be willing to pay for one. The AMC wants more business, so they should be trying to do good quality work as fast as possible. The appraisers should be thrilled to be working with professionals at a good AMC. It should all work together.

It doesn’t, though, and it doesn’t because the competition is not there to make it work. That’s the key point, IMO.

But the proposal needs to be made. What really needs to happen is that the independent AMCs need to get together and lobby WITH the NAR and NAMB to increase competition. The brokers would benefit, the Realtors would benefit, the appraisers would benefit, and even the AMCs would benefit, in the long run.

Unfortunately, at this point there IS no AMC organization to represent that point of view.

I agree that appraisers should stand-up and refuse to work for less than what they are worth. But the truth is that they are starving right now and are willing to work for anything that is remotely reasonable. By doing so they set-up the rest of the industry to do the same since the AMC now knows they have an appraiser that will work for $150 – $200 and they will continue to call them instead of those that will won’t. So if the others want the business they will either have to match their fees to the discounted ones or exit the business altogether.

Another problem with the AMC’s is that many of them yesterday were the larger appraisal companies that have simply reorganized into a “management company”. They’ve added independent appraisers to their lists to make it all look compliant, however they are still not giving any work out to people outside their office. They have simply found a way to give 80% of the business to 20% of the licensed appraisers.

I have several appraisers that I’ve used quite a bit in the past few years and all three have had no conventional loan work since April, even though they all are signed-up with several AMC’s. One that did get a call for work was offered $75 to do an appraisal. Of course he declined. He hasn’t been called again by that AMC, but you can be they found someone to do it.

So I think it’s important to not only ask for a fee schedule (brilliant idea I might add!) but also ask for an appraiser roster. AMC’s also need to be audited to insure that they are passing work around equally to their “approved appraiser list” and not just to five or six of their friends and family in the business.

By the way, share the AMC’s name that you have found to be reputable, I would love to use them also.

Lawrence M Law
Regional Director
National Credit Federation
and Vantage Credit Alliance – Credit Repair by Attorneys