Less than three months after new rules for home appraisers kicked in, the real estate industry is in uproar.
Realtors, homebuilders, mortgage brokers and the appraisal industry itself all agree the rules are causing problems. Some are backing a bill in Congress to kill them.
The new guidelines essentially put a firewall between lenders and home appraisers. They also ended the practice of lenders using their in-house staff for initial home appraisals and prohibit the use of appraisal-management companies owned or controlled by lenders.
But since they went into effect May 1, the rules have created a slew of unintended consequences that critics say are causing delays in closing sales, or undermining sales because botched appraisals are coming in too low.
“This thing is not only preventing the housing market from recovering, it’s destroying the housing market,” said Marc Savitt, president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers. “We’re eliminating competition, and we all know what happens when you eliminate competition: Prices go up.”
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03:38 PM CDT on Tuesday, July 14, 2009
