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Need an appraisal in Franklin, Grand Isle, or Chittenden County?

Great reasons why Vermont homeowners call on Lareau Appraisal Service:

  1. Pre-listing appraisals (whether they're selling the home on their own or using an agent)
  2. Challenge a property tax assessment
  3. To cut your mortgage payments by removing PMI
  4. Reinstate your Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC)
  5. To review a different appraiser's report for verification
  6. In the case of a divorce in the state of Vermont, when real estate needs to be divided
  7. To settle an estate in Vermont by determining the true market value of the property in question
Do you own a house in Franklin, Grand Isle, or Chittenden County? Do you need help deciding the value of your real estate? Contact Lareau Appraisal Service.

At Lareau Appraisal Service, we understand the special needs of a consumer seeking appraisal services. Our business practices and reporting formats are relatively routine to our business clients like lenders, attorneys, and accountants. But as a consumer, we'll be sure you get extra guidance and explanations through the appraisal process to more clearly understand what we do and how we report our conclusions.

For-Sale-by-Owner (FSBO) / Pre-Listing Services

Since you have an emotional attachment to your house, it's often very hard to be objective about it. Our professional appraisers at Lareau Appraisal Service are objective. We won't just tell you what you want to hear, we'll tell you what you need to know. In addition to helping you set a realistic price to sell at so your home will attract interested buyers, a professional appraisal is very valuable as a negotiating tool once you have a likely buyer. It gives you something concrete to show your buyer. The appraisal is an independent third party's opinion of your home's value, not just you saying how much your home is worth. Potential buyers know you have an emotional attachment to your house and will be far more likely to give credibility to an experienced appraiser's value conclusion than yours.

Challenge the assessment of your property

Let's say your home is not appreciating as much as other properties close by -- your local tax assessor may have your house overvalued. That only means you're paying more taxes than you should. The faster you take care of things like this, the better, since your property assessment may likely go up again in the next period. Getting an expert appraisal from Lareau Appraisal Service is your number one weapon when contesting your property tax assessment.

Appraisals to remove PMI

PMI stands for Private Mortgage Insurance. A popular way to cut expenses for homeowners is to get the PMI removed from their mortgage loan, thus saving them money on their monthly payments. Your monthly payments will go down once your mortgage loan is less than 80% of the value of your house. In most cases you can apply to your lender to have the PMI removed from your loan. At Lareau Appraisal Service, we're qualified in helping customers just like you abolish unneeded PMI insurance.

Was your HELOC recently frozen?

Your lender might just choose to automatically freeze your home equity line of credit (HELOC) if your property is close to a declining area -- even if your specific property has not declined in value. Not only can this be inconvenient from a cash flow angle, but it can be damaging to your credit score since it may appear as though that credit line is maxed out. Lareau Appraisal Service can provide you with efficient appraisal that will help you reinstate your home equity line of credit.

Field and Desktop Appraisal Review Services

Do you need a seasoned appraiser to double-check your appraisal for precision, or do you desire a second opinion without the added expense and delay of waiting for a whole new appraisal? In a field review we will go out and check the subject and comps in question. If you need it ASAP, we'll provide you with a desk review and verify as many facts as we can, using online data sources as well as our own files.

Do you need a retrospective review of an appraisal report? Lareau Appraisal Service can help you with that. While usually requested by banks, you may need to utilize this service if you suspect mortgage fraud related to your house.