Appraisers' Free Forum

Got up at 5:00 AM and spent 1/2 hour with the mandatory coffee. Got dressed, and left the house at 6:00 for a two-hour drive to Memphis. Had to be at the testing center by 8:00 to take the Cert General test. Of course, they hid the damned testing center off in the back somewhere and I had to hunt for it for 15 minutes. Got there on time though.

When I took the test (TN) for Cert Res, it was a joke. I used the calculator about three times because I was too lazy to do the simple problems in my head. Got finished in about 1:30. This time, though, I've got HP12C blisters on both thumbs. The CG test is 150 relevant questions (there are 15 practice questions and a 15-question survey at the end, but they don't count towards test results.) They allow eight hours, and it took me from about 8:20AM until around 2:15PM (no lunch): six hours. Grabbed a quick bite, and got home by 4:30 PM. I'm a friggin' zombie right now.

This test was more of a test than the Cert Res exam was. There are problems on property models, regression analysis, basic statistics, yield cap, and other little goodies. Many questions on commercial highest and best use; as many more on the income approach. And I caught about six *different* problems requiring solving for the equity dividend rate.

One of those HBU problems came with a table of varying costs and benefits to the building for three different uses and the as-is situation, threw in some added complications, and asked you to solve for the feasible uses. It was about 12:30. I said, "Aw, hail no! I ain't doin' all that work for 3/4 of a point." That one, and several more, got guessed at. By then, I had nearly enough points to pass, and a lot of test remaining. (I'm the penultimate crabby appraiser. The fee has to be worth the work even in the testing center.)

All in all, this TN General Appraiser test is fairly comprehensive. It's not the MAI Comprehensive, but it's a good test of one's knowledge.

And I'm sure glad I don't have to take that sucker over.

Thanks, Rhonda.

I moved this to here from the Break Room. Don't know why I put it in there in the first place, except I was a zombie when I wrote it.

Nice job Jim - although I had little doubt of you passing.

FANTASTIC!!!! CONGRATS!!!!!

Excellent Jim!

Way to go, bro

Congratulations tired dude!

And, I'll add my congratulations! (Go get some rest.)

Congrats........well done.

Now you can rest on your laurels or whatever you call those things behind you.

Obviously, the tests today are a lot tougher than they were in decades gone by...when i took it.

Ter Shields wrote:Obviously, the tests today are a lot tougher than they were in decades gone by...when i took it.

From talking to some who have taken it recently, I believe that they are more comprehensive now than they were back then. I also believe it is a better representation of an appraiser's knowledge of the subject. However, I'm not sure I would agree that makes them tougher. When I took the test (circa 1995) there were a lot of "trick" questions. There were numerous places to trip you up with answers that were very right, but not as right as another answer, which was the correct answer. There were also a lot of carefully worded questions that had to be parsed out before answering. I thought that it was more a test of your ability at test-taking than of your ability as an appraiser.

There are "trick" questions on this one, too, if by "trick" you mean distractor answers.
Example: A loan is made a 6% for 30 years with monthly amortization. What's the mortgage constant?
Let's say you punch in:
30 n
6 i
1 chs PV
PMT= 0.0726

You can bet 7.26% will be in the field of answers. You can also expect this:
30 gN
6 gi
1 chs PV
PMT = 0.006

Well, 0.006 or 0.6% will also be an available choice.

Of course, you punch 12 x (monthly amortization, so multiply by 12) after the last answer to get the true constant: 7.19%

They let you screw up any way you like, and conveniently offer you the opportunity to record your mistake for posterity. They also offer distractor information in the problem, like including the fact that the mortgage is for $1 million, and the borrower is putting up $300K of his own money, but the contract calls for $50K in repairs to be made by the seller. If you didn't know what you were doing, you could chase your tail with this thing for half an hour.

They let you screw up any way you like, and conveniently offer you the opportunity to record your mistake for posterity.

That's how I would make exams.

The upside is, you will probably never need to make those calcuations again. I was helping one guy with some shortcuts to calculator questions and he asked, "Do you really need to know all of this to be an appraiser?" And I said, "Of course not. You only need to know that to pass the test."

The upside is, you will probably never need to make those calculations again.

I seriously doubt that. Most of the problems were everyday appraisal problems, albeit watered down. Not at all tricky if you know the material; just tedious. You have to know what you need to answer the question. Read the last sentence first, then read the question to see what they give you vs. what you have to derive.

Some of them are more damned work than they're worth, and I left those laying on the table. (I will NOT do a four-scenario HBU analysis for any 2/3 of a point unless I MUST have it to pass.) As you say, the objective is to pass the test, not to make the highest score.