Appraisal Services & Fees

I publish my fees because the alternative — making every prospective client call for a number — wastes your time and mine. These are starting prices for a single-family home or condominium. Acreage, unusual or high-liability property, and extended travel can raise the figure, and when they do I say so before you order rather than afterward on the invoice.

Report Types

Product	From	What it includes
GroundWork Report	$99	Data, not a valuation — and it says so. You get the qualifying closed sales surrounding the home sorted into five distance tiers, each tier reporting its own middle sale price and price per square foot, the county record for the parcel, a year of trend charts, an interactive estimator, an unadjusted price band carrying no opinion of value, and a candid read on how strong the underlying data actually is. It arrives the next business day as a private web page that saves to PDF. Order an appraisal afterward and this fee comes off the top.
Basic Desktop Appraisal	$299	The complete comparable sales analysis, adjustments included, delivered in a condensed report. Written under USPAP. Revisions are covered. I never set foot on the property.
Desktop Appraisal	$449	A full narrative report: the property described in detail, maps placing it in its location and neighborhood, photographs of each comparable sale, an analysis of market conditions, and the parcel's transaction history. Still no site visit.
Drive-By Appraisal	$649	Takes the Desktop report and adds what I can document from the curb — exterior photographs I shot myself and first-hand observation of the surrounding street and neighborhood.
Standard Appraisal	$699	The Desktop report plus my walking through the house. I inspect inside and out, photograph both, and assess condition room by room. This is the tier that satisfies the IRS for improved residential property and the one I bring to court.
2–4 Unit Desktop Appraisal	$549	Desktop treatment for a duplex, triplex or fourplex, built from public records and MLS data, with each unit analyzed rather than the building averaged.
2–4 Unit Standard Appraisal	$799	The inspection-based report for two-to-four unit property. I walk every unit, not a representative one.

Add-Ons

Add-on	Fee	Detail
Square Footage Measurement	$35 per 1,500 sq ft	I measure the living area by laser and certify the figure. Attaches to any report tier.
Rush Delivery	+30%	Moves your assignment up the queue when my calendar has room. I confirm it is actually possible before taking the surcharge.

Which Product Do You Actually Need?

This is the question worth getting right, and the honest answer is not always the cheaper product.

If the IRS will see it and the property is an improved residence, you need the Standard appraisal. A desktop report does not satisfy IRS requirements for improved residential property. Vacant land is the exception and can be appraised from the desk.

If a court or opposing attorney will see it — divorce, probate dispute, bankruptcy — a desktop appraisal is commonly accepted, and I prepare them for these purposes constantly. Where condition is contested, an inspection is worth its cost because it removes the easiest line of attack.

If the property is outside San Diego or Riverside County, a desktop appraisal is the available instrument, since in-person inspection is limited to those two counties.

If you are not ready for an appraisal at all, the $99 GroundWork report gives you the surrounding sales data, twelve months of trend charts and an unadjusted price range — explicitly no opinion of value — delivered the next business day. If you order a Desktop or Standard appraisal afterward, the $99 is credited against it.

Tell me the property and what the report is for, and I will tell you which tier fits. I would rather talk you into the right product than deliver a cheap one that fails when it matters.

Discounts and Billing

A 5% discount applies to cash-equivalent payment — Zelle, check or cash. Where both spouses jointly retain me in a dissolution matter, a two-client fee applies that costs considerably less than two separate reports. Expert-witness testimony is quoted separately from the report and billed by time.

What These Reports Are For

Everything on this schedule is specialty work: date-of-death valuations and step-up basis, estate and trust administration, gift tax reporting, private party and intra-family transactions, divorce and dissolution, bankruptcy, Proposition 19 transfers, and property tax appeals. Those are the purposes the reports are built for and the readers — the IRS, the courts, counsel, CPAs and fiduciaries — they are written to satisfy.

Services

• Date of Death Appraisals
• Estate & Trust Appraisals
• Private Party & Gift Tax Appraisals
• Divorce Appraisals
• Proposition 19 Appraisals
• Property Tax Appeal Appraisals
• Bankruptcy Appraisals
• Expert Witness & Litigation Support
• Appraisal Review
• Desktop Appraisals
• Rental & Income Analysis
• Pre-Purchase Appraisals
• Pre-Sale Appraisals
• PMI Removal Appraisals