No kitchen appliances! Appraisal?

Question

After a big brand new kitchen renovation, the appliances are still shipping. If the appraisal is scheduled before the appliances arrive, will that hurt the value?? If so, how to combat that?

John Warren · Answer

@Nicholas Mazdra meet the appraiser at the home and give them the invoice for the appliances. You should be fine. Unless these are crazy expensive, a nice appliance package is easy for an appraiser to visualize.

Patrick Britton · Answer

@Nicholas Mazdra   Couple of things:

First: have documentation showing that you have ordered the appliances and also include whatever the cost of those appliances are so that the appraiser isn't forced to make assumptions that might not line up with reality.

Second:  Depending on how the kitchen is set up, a lot of these appliances could be considered personal property.  Personal property is not counted in a real estate appraisal.  Consider a microwave that simply sits on the countertop as opposed to being built into the cabinetry or part of an oven range setup.

Third:  appraisers can very often make adjustments for things but at the end of the day, depending on the price of the property it might not make that big of a difference.  for example, 5% on a $250,000 house is within the margin of error and with or without appliances shouldn't have a significant impact on the final estimate of value.

I have had appraisals done on properties that had all of the appliances including a washer and dryer and then on other properties that had absolutely no appliance whatsoever and all else equal, I could not determine if there was a statistically significant difference in value between the two.  Of course, that was in the Southside of Chicago which is a very specific market.  It may come down to the expectations. In other words, are listings similar to yours in your neighborhood assumed to have all of the appliances?  If it is typical in your area for the property to come with all of the appliances, then there's the possibility that perhaps indirectly or subconsciously, the appraiser will value your property a little bit less than the comparables.

What I would suggest doing is to reach out to your loan officer and get their opinion on the matter and do whatever you can to try to find an appraiser and simply ask them to what extent it possibly could hurt value.

David Lee Hall, III · Answer

@Mary Cronin is right. Have documentation on what is coming. A couple of my refinance appraisals have been at 90% completion. In each case the appraiser took into account the minor unfinished things being completed. Limited experience, yes, but it seems if you have the evidence of what will be, it will be considered.

Mary Cronin · Answer

You can get an appraisal based on an architech/engineer's drawing of a whole house or apartment house or a new commercial building - so as a guess, be prepared with pictures of the appliances. I would think brand new appliances can only help. My $0.02 worth, though. I'm guessing.

No kitchen appliances! Appraisal?

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