KEYS AND ASSOCIATES, LLC
ST AUGUSTINE, FLORIDA

Real estate lenders are a funny lot. It seems they're happy to lend anybody money. Assuming a half-way decent credit rating, any potential home buyer can secure a loan for a house. Why? Because these transactions are secured by a very valuable asset: the home itself. If a borrower defaults on a loan, the risk for the lender is often only the difference between the value of the home and the amount outstanding on the loan, less the amount it costs them to foreclose and resell the property. For this reason, lenders are very wary of lending more than a certain percentage of a home's value. Traditionally, this has been 80 percent. The cushion this provides the lender helps ensure that their losses from loan defaults are kept to a minimum. The hardest thing for most home owners to know is just when does their home equity rise above this magical 20 percent point? A certified, licensed real estate appraiser can certainly help. It is an appraiser's job to know the market dynamics of their area. They know when property values have risen - or declined. Many appraisers offer specific services to help customers find the value of their homes and remove PMI payments. Faced with this data, the mortgage company will most often eliminate the PMI with little trouble. The savings from dropping the PMI pays for the appraisal in a matter of months. At which time, the home owner can enjoy the savings from that point on. Our investment in training and technology has helped our customers greatly reduce their workload. By offering online appraisal ordering, coupled with automatic report status updates and electronic delivery of the final product, we are able to eliminate the run around and phone tag hassles associated with this process. And since this saves us money as well, we can keep our rates competitive with anybody in the industry. Do you have a question relating to real estate appraisals? We can help. Simply fill out the form below and we'll contact you with the answer, with no obligation to you. We guarantee your privacy.