When buying a home and the appraised value is below the offered amount, do not despair. There are still a few things that can be done to save the deal and complete purchase.
Re-evaluate
The first thing to do is to scrutinize the report for the details. What comparable homes were used? Are there better comparable homes? Do the adjustments make sense? Was something overlooked or undervalued? To properly address these questions you are going to need the help of your realtor. You will be relying on the realtor’s experience in home valuations and knowledge of the area. Further, the realtor will need to find all the nearby recent sales and listings of similar homes. Then all this data has to be compared to the comparable homes used in the report to see which ones are really most appropriate. If your search finds better matches, you should request a formal explanation from the appraiser as to why the better matches were overlooked.
Bring Cash
A simpler solution can be to make up the difference between the appraised value and the offered amount with additional cash from the buyer. If the home is the one the buyer really wants, there are a lot of other offers and few other homes for sale, this can make sense as long as the buyer has the cash available.
Lower The Price
When cash is tight and there aren’t other offers, you can negotiate with the seller to lower the agreed-upon price to the appraised value. This only works if none of the other buyers are willing to make up the difference in cash.
New Appraisal
A radical approach can be to have a different appraiser arrive at their appraised value. This can mean having to find a new lender first and then doing an appraisal through the new lender. All this takes time thus delaying the close of escrow. You will need the cooperation of the seller as everyone needs to agree to the considerably longer timelines and the fact that there is no guarantee the appraisal will come in higher.
Photo by William Iven on Unsplash
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