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ELLIOTT® OFFERS LAND SURVEYS
NATIONWIDE
 ELLIOTT® &
Company Appraisers has expanded its lineup of services to include
land surveys and offers them anywhere in the United States.
“We are
responding to a demand from our clients,” said Carlyle Holt, general
manager of ELLIOTT® & Company Appraisers. “We found surveying to fit
well with the types of services we offer as a full service vendor
management company.”
Among the land
surveys performed by ELLIOTT® are boundary surveys, building
placement surveys, topographical surveys, overlap surveys and
encroachment surveys.
FHA NOW REQUIRES INDIVIDUAL
APPRAISAL
OF HOMES WITHIN PROJECTS
 In
the past, developers, seeking an FHA-insured loan, had been able to
order a master appraisal report (MAP), in some cases where a
development contained similar units. This is no longer the case.
Developers must now order an individual appraisal for each unit
within the development in order to obtain an FHA loan for the
project.
The decision was
announced in an FHA Mortgagee letter last month, which stated, “As
economic instability continues to impact many segments of the
economy and the housing segment in particular, the department has
determined that it is in the best interest of the Insurance Fund to
prohibit the use of MARs and to require an individual appraisal be
performed on each individual unit within a larger housing project to
determine the maximum mortgage amount of the property to be security
for the mortgage.”
MILLION-DOLLAR HOME SALES PICKING
UP IN CALIFORNIA
While overall
home sales, once again, declined in California last year, sales of
homes at $1 million or more increased in the Golden State for the
first time since 2005. During the housing slump, high-end home sales
are said to have been more affected than that of more modest homes,
so this marks a reversal of that trend.
DataQuick
Information Systems, the San Diego-based firm that conducted the
study, reported that 22,529 homes sold in California for at least $1
million in 2010, compared to 18,621 such sales in 2009. Overall
California home sales, according to the study dropped from 460,166
in 2009 to 418,578 last year.
“Prestige
homebuyers respond to a different set of motivations than the rest
of us,” said DataQuick President John Walsh. “Their decisions are
less dependent on jobs, prices and interest rates, and more on how
their portfolio is doing.”
 ELLIOTT®
COMPLETES ANOTHER
BBB COMPLAINT-FREE YEAR
For the 13th
consecutive year, ELLIOTT® & Company Appraisers received a
certificate from the Better Business Bureau reporting that it had
completed another complaint-free year (2010). The company retains an
A+ rating with the BBB, which grades companies from A+ to F.
“ELLIOTT® &
Company Appraisers has been a member in good standing with us for
many years,” said Kevin Hinterberger, president of the Better
Business Bureau of Central North Carolina. “Since ELLIOTT® joined us
in 1998, we have never received a complaint about this company.”
HOMES ARE MORE AFFORDABLE AS
HOMEOWNERSHIP LEVEL DROPS
Recent studies
that show conflicting trends point to the nature of the economy.
Despite homeownership becoming affordable to a higher percentage of
the U.S. population, the percentage of homeowners in this country
continues to drop. A study conducted by Moody’s Analytics concluded
that housing affordability is the highest it has been since 2003. As
of September 2010, the Moody’s study revealed, the ratio of home
price to annual income was down to 1.6 to 1, the lowest it has been
in 35 years.
Meanwhile, the
U.S. Department of Commerce reported that U.S. homeownership was at
66.5% in the fourth quarter of last year. The department also
reported that the rental-vacancy rate is at 9.4%, the lowest it has
been since the second quarter of 2007.
“Further
foreclosures, a continuation of poor economic and tight credit
conditions (indicate) that the homeownership rate probably has
further to fall,” said Paul Dales, senior U.S. economist for Capital
Economics, the firm that compiled the data for the Commerce
Department. “The desire to own a home is clearly much weaker than it
once was.”
SHADOW INVENTORY EXPECTED TO LAST
FOUR MORE YEARS
 According
to last year’s fourth quarter report of Standard & Poor’s Rating
Services, 49 more months will be needed to clear the shadow
inventory (property in which the borrowers are 90 days or more
delinquent) of distressed homes in the United States. This is a
significantly longer length of time than what had been expected in
previous reports on the subject.
“Our recent
estimates of months to clear have increased primarily because of the
deceleration of the distressed property liquidation rate rather than
a rise in overall distressed property levels,” the S&P report read.
“It seems that 90-plus-day delinquent loans and foreclosed
properties are taking longer to become REO, which is lengthening the
overall timelines for resolving troubled assets.”
 ASK MARTITIA
QUESTION: In a circumstance in which
an appraiser needs to authorize someone to apply his digital
signature for him, would that appraiser be in violation of USPAP if
he gave that person his Personal Identification Number (PIN) or
password?
MARTITIA: No. The sharing
of a PIN or a password is not a violation of the Uniform Standards
of Professional Appraisal Practice. According to USPAP’s Ethics
Rule, appraisers are only allowed to authorize the use of their
signatures “on an assignment-by-assignment basis.” An appraiser
cannot affix the electronic signature of another appraiser without
that appraiser’s permission.
Martitia Mortimer, Elliott’s executive vice president, answers
appraisal questions on a regular basis in Elliott Evaluation
News.
QUOTES
“Energy and
persistence conquer all things.” – Benjamin Franklin
“The secret to a
good sermon is to have a good beginning and a good ending; and have
the two as close together as possible.” – George Burns
“Laziness is
nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired.” –
Jules Renard
“A good name,
like good will, is got by many actions and lost by one.” – Lord
Jeffery
“When we are
planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not
hereditary.” – Thomas Paine
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kevin@elliottco.com
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