Owner-Occupied Mortgage PMI - Through Forced Appreciation Only?

[Robert Leonard]

On my personal residence (a property I plan to rent out eventually), I have a conventional 30-year fixed mortgage with Wells Fargo. I purchased the property back in April 2018 and only had to put 5% down. Due to some recent sales in our neighborhood, the comps have increased the value of my property and given me the 20% equity (80% LTV) needed to remove PMI. However, when I spoke with Wells Fargo an hour ago, I was told that in order to remove PMI, the value of the property must be increased due to "significant improvements made to the property", not through natural price appreciation.

Has anyone come across this before? What are your thoughts?

I was told that Wells Fargo isn't able to tell me what's considered "significant". It is up to the appraiser or broker (if I chose to do a Brokers Price Opinion). I've put in a new hot water heater (about $2k) and put about $10k into fencing/major landscaping (bringing in equipment, etc). I'd consider this in total to be significant, but the idea of "significant" being determined by a third party seems a bit "gray"...

Robert Leonard