Appraisal is too low

[Eli M.]

Dear BP family,

My appraisal came in lower than I expected.

What is the best course of action now?

For the future, can I ask the appraiser to send me the draft before he submits it to the bank?

In case the new appraisal is higher can I sue the old appraise?

Thank you all in advance

[Chris Mason]

> "In case the new appraisal is higher can I sue the old appraise?"

Nope. The legal standard appraisers are held to is "credible," not "accurate." Sucks.

Residential appraising is fundamentally broken, Dodd Frank broke it. And to be clear, it was broken before 2008 too, it's just broken in new ways. Like if your car's brakes are on the fritz, you take it in, they fix the brakes but trash your transmission in the process. That's Dodd Frank in a nutshell. 

Something I've noticed since leaving retail lending (employee of one lender, retail rate sheet) for wholesale (independent contractor, shop multiple lenders, wholesale rate sheet) is that the better priced lenders want lower risk loans and sometimes use more conservative appraisers. None of the salespersons working for these lenders will admit that to me, of course (& forget about it if you're a low mortgage volume consumer), since everyone promises the world.... is that extra 0.125% to rate worth a 25% chance of an appraisal killing the deal? Most first time homebuyers would say "omg yes!" and most Realtors would say "no, are you a freaking moron?! Play that game on a refi where the stakes are substantially lower if it doesn't go through."