Real Estate Appraisers Editing and Proofreading Services

A valuation is a number derived from other people's transactions, none of which involved the property being valued. The skill is not in finding comparables — anybody can find them — it is in the adjustments: this one sold nine months ago in a different market, that one had a bigger garden, the third one was a probate sale between family members. Those adjustments are the valuation, and most reports report them as a total.

We edit what valuers and appraisers produce — valuation reports and their comparable analysis, adjustment and reconciliation documentation, market commentary and evidence sections, inspection and property description content, income and investment approach documentation, scope of work and reliance documentation, review and audit responses, valuations for lending, accounts and dispute purposes, retrospective and hypothetical valuation reports, and correspondence with clients and reviewers. Our editors work on the adjustments between the comparables and the answer.

The comparable analysis and its adjustments are where a valuation is either defensible or an assertion with evidence attached, and their failure is presenting the comparables and the conclusion with the reasoning compressed into a sentence. A reviewer, a lender's auditor or an opposing expert will go straight to the adjustments. We work through these so each comparable is analysed with its adjustments itemised and quantified — time, size, condition, location, aspect, tenure, the circumstances of the sale — since a total adjustment of eight per cent conceals whether that was one large judgement or five small ones; so the direction and the basis of each adjustment is stated, given that a size adjustment derived from paired sales is evidence and one derived from experience is an opinion, and both are legitimate if labelled; so the weight given to each comparable is stated with why, because a valuation that weights all four equally has not been reconciled; so any transaction that is not at arm's length is identified with what was done about it; so the market movement between the transaction dates and the valuation date is evidenced rather than assumed, as this is the adjustment most often applied by feel; so the comparables that were rejected are named with the reason, since their absence is the first thing a reviewer notices; and so the conclusion states where in the range the figure sits and why. Reports written this way survive review.

Everything you send is treated in confidence, including valuations, comparable evidence and client information. We are editors rather than valuers, and we offer no view on values, comparables or adjustments. What we can do is make the reasoning between the evidence and the figure visible.