Most people asking for this do not need it
I would rather say that on the first page than at the bottom of the third.
If you want a list price for an ordinary house in a town where similar houses have been selling, a good agent’s comparative market analysis will get you there. It is free, it is fast, and it is prepared by somebody with a real stake in getting the number right, because they only get paid if the house sells. That is a decent set of incentives and there is no honest way for me to compete with free.
Call me anyway if you like. But if what you describe on the phone is that situation, I will tell you so.
When it does earn the fee
The appraisal earns its keep the moment the number has to convince somebody who is not you.
- A sale to a relative or a friend. You will need to show the price was arm’s length, potentially years later, to a tax authority that was not in the room.
- Co-owners or heirs who disagree. Siblings arguing over a parent’s house settle faster against an independent figure than against each other’s research.
- A divorce or an estate. The number will be relied on and possibly challenged, and it needs to have been developed properly the first time.
- A property nobody can price. Two agents, two very different numbers, neither able to explain the gap. That usually means the comparables are thin or the property is genuinely unusual, and that is exactly the work an appraisal is built for.
What it will not do
It will not stop the buyer’s lender appraisal coming in low.
That appraiser will be ordered by the lender, from the lender’s own panel, and will have no knowledge of my report and no obligation to it. Anyone suggesting otherwise is describing something that does not happen.
What this report does instead is narrower and still worth something: it tells you in advance where that appraiser is likely to have trouble. Which comparables support the price and which do not. Which condition items get written up. What the unpermitted basement is likely to do to the square footage credited. A surprise at contract stage is much easier to handle if you saw it coming in January.
The unpermitted-work conversation
Tell me at the start. It happens constantly in the older stock across Passaic, Essex and Union, and it does not shock me.
What it affects is how the space can be credited and what a lender’s appraiser is likely to do with it — which is a real valuation question rather than a moral one. Finding out mid-analysis means rewriting the analysis. Finding out from a buyer’s attorney after you are under contract is considerably worse.
What you receive
A written report with a current effective date, the sales relied on named, the adjustments explained, a note of the condition items likely to surface later, and a signed USPAP certification.
What you will not receive is a list price. That is a marketing decision built on top of the value opinion, and it belongs to you and your agent — it turns on how fast you need to sell and how much negotiating room you want, and neither of those is an appraisal question.
New Jersey specifics
- Unpermitted basement finishes and rear additions run right through the older housing stock in Passaic, Essex and Union, and they are the single commonest reason an owner's expectation and a lender's appraisal end up far apart.
- Across much of Bergen and Essex the school district and municipal lines run mid-block, so materially different values sit a few hundred feet from each other and a radius search cannot see it.
What you receive
- A report with a current effective date
- A conclusion with the sales relied on and the adjustments explained
- A note of condition items likely to surface in a buyer's lender appraisal
- Signed USPAP certification
What I need from you
- Interior access, including the basement and any finished attic
- Improvement documentation, with permits where the work was permitted
- Any known defects, and any permits still open