You will have to pay for the appraisal upfront, so do examine a "fee worksheet" from the lender before you order the appraisal, so you can examine all the costs associated with the loan.  

As an investor, though, I would suggest you examine your goals for the long-term and evaluate the house as if it were something you were thinking of buying.

I took my exam in 2014; only 4 questions involved math, and it was math I could do with a basic calculator.

@Ephrem Bekere a "conventional" loan will be examining your income, credit, and asset when refinancing a loan.  

We do have to examine our goals and see if that guides us to the right answer for us.

Maybe contact the medical examiner in your area and ask if there was a relative as informant on the death certificate and if not, contact the public administrator in your area, who would be responsible for handling estates of decedents without known relatives. 

Also, should I have a contractor go with me to examine the damage?

Once you have examined your strengths, weakness, and desires pick one area to try at first. 

David,I am an experienced real estate tax accountant who worked for the IRS as a Tax Examiner and later in the Criminal Investigation Division, I taught college level tax and accounting and now like you owns and operates a series of residential and commercial units in and out of NJ, my home state for almost 13 years and like you own the residentials personally and the commercial ones in LLC's.

Less fortunate are Cleveland, Phoenix and much of Florida, where prices are still at least 26 percent below where they were before the bubble burst.However, examining the data in real terms tells a different story: adjusted for inflation, home prices remain nearly 20% below their pre-crisis peak.