In a Continuing Education class Tuesday night, the topic presented by an Appraisal Institute Instructor was "Concessions" in sales contracts and how to deal with them when making adjustments to the comparable sales. Most of what I heard was nonspecific and the MAI instructor's main words of direction were "It depends", "Not necessarily" and "Do the research and the decision is the appraiser's based on the findings."
I've read a lot on declining markets. If you have been following the market, you can see that Sacramento is a declining market. Citi and Wells both define it as such. Does that mean that the declining market box should be automatically checked for any Sacramento area appraisal? Once again, it depends, not necessarily and do the research...
In preparing an appraisal report I research both concessions and the declining market issue when evaluating a property and do not rely on a standardized rule of thumb. Above all, the report must accurately reflect current conditions as they affect the value of the subject.