Real estate appraisal services for homeowners in the city of Harbor Springs and Emmet County

See the top seven reasons why MI homeowners call on Stephen and Associates Appraisals:

  1. Find the right listing price (whether they're selling the home on their own or using a real estate agent)
  2. Challenge a property tax assessment
  3. Remove PMI to cut your monthly mortgage payment
  4. Reinstate their Home Equity Line of Credit (or HELOC)
  5. Review another appraiser's report for verification
  6. If property needs to be divided because of a divorce
  7. Settle an estate in MI by determining the true market value of real estate in question

Need help deciding the price of your house in or near Harbor Springs, MI?
Contact Stephen and Associates Appraisals.

At Stephen and Associates Appraisals, we understand the special needs of a homeowner seeking appraisal services. Our business practices and reporting formats are relatively routine to our business clients like banks, attorneys, and accountants. Being a person not in the real estate business that probably doesn't look at appraisals every day,we'll be sure you get extra guidance and explanations through the appraisal process to better understand what we do and how we document our findings.

Pre-listing Services/For Sale By Owner

It's very hard to be objective about your own house because you probably have an emotional attachment to it. Our professional appraisers at Stephen and Associates Appraisals are objective. We won't just tell you what you want to hear, we will tell you what you need to know. In addition to helping you set a realistic selling price so your home will attract interested buyers, a professional appraisal is very important as a negotiating tool once you have a potential buyer. It's something concrete to show the buyer. An appraisal is an independent third party's opinion of your property's value -- not just you saying how much your home is worth. Interested buyers assume you have an emotional attachment to your house and will be more likely to give credibility to an accomplished appraiser's value report than yours.

Appraisals to remove PMI

A popular money saver for homeowners is to get the PMI removed from their mortgage loan, thus saving them money on their monthly payments. PMI stands for "Private Mortgage Insurance". Your monthly payments will go down once your mortgage loan is down below 80% of the value of your house. In most cases you can apply to the lender to have the PMI removed from your loan. Stephen and Associates Appraisals is experts in helping consumers just like you do away with unneeded and unwanted PMI insurance.

Challenging a property tax assessment

Your local tax assessor may have your home overvalued if you live in an area that's going down or is not appreciating as much as other houses close to yours. That means you're probably paying more taxes than you should. The earlier you take care of a matter like this, the better off you'll be, since your property assessment may likely go up again in the next period. Getting an appraisal report from Stephen and Associates Appraisals is your strongest weapon when challenging your property tax assessment.

Recently got a freeze your HELOC?

Even if your specific property has not declined in value, your lender might decide to automatically freeze your home equity line of credit (HELOC) if your home is near a declining area. This can this be inconvenient from a cash flow viewpoint, and negative on your credit score since it may appear as though that credit line is maxed out. An expert appraisal from Stephen and Associates Appraisals can help you reinstate your HELOC.

We Also Provide Field and Desktop Appraisal Review Services

Have you just accepted a copy of your appraisal and you'd like to have a seasoned expert double-check it for preciseness or do you desire a second opinion without the added cost and delay of waiting for a whole new appraisal? We can go out and check the subject and comparables in a field review. Or, if you're in a hurry, we can provide desk review and verify as many facts as we can using online data sources as well as our own files.

Need a retrospective review of an appraisal? We can help you with that While typically requested by banks, you may want to employ this service if you suspect mortgage fraud related to your home.