A report that expects to be attacked
Most appraisals are read once by an underwriter and filed. This one is read by somebody actively hoping to find something wrong with it.
That does not change the value — the value is whatever the evidence supports. It changes everything around the value. Which sales were selected, and why those rather than the others nearby. What each adjustment is for and what supports its size. What I inspected and what I could not. Anything that would ordinarily sit in an appraiser’s head as an unstated assumption gets written down instead.
If opposing counsel intends to go through it line by line, the lines should be there to go through.
The date is counsel’s decision
This is where money gets wasted in matrimonial work, and it is almost always wasted before I am engaged.
Marital property in New Jersey is identified as of the day the complaint was filed. The date at which the house is valued for distribution is a separate question, it is fact-specific, and in practice it often sits much closer to trial or settlement than to the filing. Which date governs is a legal determination and it is not mine to make.
What I need is an instruction. If counsel has fixed a date, give it to me and the report is built around it. If the date is still being argued over, say that at the outset — the engagement can be written so that a second effective date is added later without rebuilding the analysis from nothing, which is far cheaper than commissioning two full reports.
In a market that has moved, two candidate dates six months apart can be tens of thousands apart. That is a large amount of money to leave to an assumption.
What retention does and does not buy
You can engage me jointly, one of you can engage me, or your attorney can. All three are ordinary and none of them changes the analysis.
A joint engagement is usually the cheapest route and it has the practical advantage that both sides end up arguing from a single figure rather than trading two. Where each side retains separately, the report I write is the report I would have written either way. The USPAP ethics rule obliges impartiality regardless of who pays, and an appraiser who would shade a number toward the party holding the invoice has produced something worthless to that party the moment it is challenged.
What retention decides is who my client is and who is entitled to receive the report. That is all it decides.
Equitable is not equal
Worth knowing, because it shapes what the number is for.
New Jersey distributes marital property equitably, under a list of statutory factors, rather than dividing it in half by default. The house’s value is one input into that analysis. It is not the outcome, and an appraisal that comes in higher or lower than you hoped does not translate directly into a proportional change in what either party receives. That translation is your attorney’s work, not mine.
What you receive
A written report carrying the effective date you or counsel specify, with the comparables named, the adjustments explained, and a signed certification including the statement of independence.
It goes to whoever the engagement letter names. In a joint retention that is normally both attorneys, simultaneously, which is the arrangement least likely to generate an argument about who saw what first.
New Jersey specifics
- New Jersey distributes marital property equitably under statutory factors rather than splitting it down the middle by default. The appraisal supplies one input to that analysis; it does not decide anything on its own.
- The date the house is valued for distribution is a legal determination. It is not the appraiser's to choose, and it frequently sits nearer to trial or distribution than to the date the complaint was filed.
- Order the work before that date is fixed and you risk buying the wrong one. Where counsel has not fixed it, say so and the engagement can be written to add a second date later at reduced cost.
- USPAP binds an appraiser retained by one spouse to exactly the impartiality it requires of a jointly retained one. Retention buys an opinion. It does not buy an ally.
What you receive
- A report carrying the effective date counsel or the parties specify
- A conclusion with the comparables named and every adjustment explained
- Signed USPAP certification including the statement of independence
- Delivery to whoever the engagement names — commonly both attorneys, or the retaining one
What I need from you
- Who is engaging me: one party, both jointly, or counsel
- The effective date, or word that it is still being negotiated
- Interior access, including to any part of the house one party has moved out of
- Documentation of improvements, and anything known to be wrong with the property