Well, the DAY before we left, the appraiser came by to look at our house. He decided he was not going to include my half bath into the square footage because it opens onto the porch like a mud room. Well, that aggravated me and I told him that it is heated square feet. The a/c and heat run all year around in it…so why not? Anyway, it did not get included in the appraisal.
Not only is that irritating, but we got the appraisal back this weekend when we got back in town. Our property was compared to 3 houses: 1) 22 miles away (yes, you read that right…22 miles away and in a different town!); 2) the second house was 15 miles away; and 3) one on Marye Street in the Garden District (the Garden District is where we live). The first two properties are considered RURAL and everyone knows that property values in rural settings are significantly lower than in URBAN settings. Also, the appraiser made several notes about the large deductions he made. He said that he made higher than normal deductions because he wanted to accurately reflect the value of our house…..? Umm….I guess he meant the value he personally thought it should be. Our house appraised for $56/sq foot…in a completely fixed state. That is a 4200 heated square foot house, wraparound porch, 4 bedrooms, 3 baths, a living room, dining room, kitchen, study, recreation room, new paint outside. I wonder how a house one street over appraises for $300-400k for less square footage, but mine only appraised for $230? Give me a break! It is not even worth borrowing the money to have it fixed if they believe that after all the work we are going to do it will only appraise for $230????
I kicked it back to the bank and asked them to PLEASE find some houses that are closer, like, in the SAME town. I further informed them that we lived in Alexandria, not Lecompte or Cheneyville.
We shall see what happens!!!!!
Perpetual Renovator 