In another example of the Noem Administration’s failure to consult with stakeholders, the Legislature’s Rules Review Committee once again rejected the Department of Labor and Regulation’s proposal to create a new training program for real estate appraisers. The state is trying to get more appraisers in the pipeline, but the state’s appraisers say the plan as conceived won’t work:
Sandra Gretsch, president with the Professional Appraiser Association of South Dakota, said graduates under the new training program will struggle to find work.
“They’ll be a new appraiser, but not particularly hirable or employable,” Gresh said. “So they will have to go to the existing appraisers to try to get a job with them as an advanced trainee with a credential” [Lee Strubinger, “Legislative Panel Directs State and Appraiser Industry to Settle Differences over Training,” SDPB, 2022.09.14].
Governor Noem has wrecked the state’s relationship with real estate appraisers. She pushed the state’s longtime appraisal certification chief, Sherry Bren, out of her job after Bren refused to certify her daughter for real estate appraising despite multiple exam failures. Bren’s replacement was under orders from the Noem Administration not to talk to appraisers. The state tried pushing ahead with rule changes last spring despite strong industry opposition; now it appears Noem’s Department of Labor still hasn’t figured out how to communicate with the appraisers, despite the expressed expectations of legislators:
Democratic Rep. Ryan Cwach said that’s what lawmakers expected to see this week.
“I feel that we actually—at the last meeting—kind of set out what we expected to see when they came back. We haven’t seen that,” Cwach said. “I don’t think this has been a good example of good government working” [Strubinger, 2022.09.14].
Engage with stakeholders, get better results. Shut out stakeholders, get garbage. When Kristi Noem shuts out South Dakota experts and spends all of her time talking to out-of-state donors and pundits, we get bad government, not good solutions to real problems.
They should just close down the appraisal program and let the industry regulate itself. There are plenty of fellows out there who can do appraisals just fine without government regulation. Why, half of the appraisers dabble in it on the side gig as it is, when anyone with a nickle of common sense could do the job. Let the market drive the value, not some fake appraisal, that’s what grudznick says.
Grudz. What do you say about the Savings & Loan scandal and the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis and the moral hazards created that corrupt appraisers actively participated in? My concern would be that the market would again be inflated and passed thru many questionable ‘lenders”.
Appraisers are a pain, waste a lot of paper and time, but probably a somewhat necessary evil. We aren’t talking about single home loans but complicated real estate transactions with some rather dubious origins and intentions on occasion.
There are no stakeholders in Governor Noem’s world; there are only the political inner circle (and family). It is totalitarian in nature, dogmatic. Never mind how problematic that becomes when combined with a hands-off, cannot-be-bothered governing approach.
If you have seen the movie, Don’t Look Up, compare the portrayed president played by Meryl Streep to Kristi Noem. I believe she was specifically modeled for Streep’s role, complete with her hype-man, Jonah Hill, playing Ian Fury.
One of her lines when the richest man in the world is beckoning her during a discussion with scientists over how to save the planet is eerily spot-on. As she interrupts the scientists because the Bill Gates-esque character is throwing a tantrum, she says something like, “He is a Platinum Eagle Donor, which allots him full top secret access to the president whenever he wants.”
Mammal, I had the very same reaction to Streep’s character in “Don’t Look Up.”
grudznick needs intervention …
Grudz..You have become deluded and dazed…we have deregulated airlines (what a pleasure that’s been), the Savings and Loans (they went bust and caused a financial crises in which millions of people lost substantial amounts of retirement savings in the 90’s), the Mortgage Industry (ask George Bush, Jaime Diamond, Hank Peterson, and millions of retirees how that went), and Electric Energy companies (the EnRon nightmare, Texas is suffering from the long term outcomes of deregulation right now). Deregulating the Appraisal business would lead to wide scale looting.
Arlo–wide scale looting is probably what grudz has in mind. It is a lobbyist’s nightly dream.
Grudz, it doesn’t sound like you understand what real estate appraisers do. The market does determine the value of real estate. Sellers ask, buyers offer, and sales happen. But the appraiser doesn’t tell the seller how much to ask or the buyer how much to offer. The appraiser tells the bank how much of the agreed sale price the bank sould dare cover with its loan.
Appraisers don’t skew the market with fake information; appraisers provide banks with independent analysis to guide the banks’ choice to let buyers purchase houses without cash on hand. Appraisers keep banks from floating risky loans that could cause bigger problems for everybody in the market. Doing that work requires good training. Federal rules require that appraisers get good training. Governor Noem’s DLR seems heck-bent on reeducing the quality of that training, just to make it look like Governor Noem is working to solve an appraiser shortage.
Note, Grudz, that Noem isn’t endorsing your position. She’s saying we need more appraisers, not none, as you suggest. And from the sounds of what the appraisers are saying, Noem’s plan would rush more bad appraisers into the marketplace, undertrained knuckleheads who would more likely produce more of the “fake” appraisals that seem to concern you.
Mr. Spike, it is clear that the failures of groups of stupid people cause those stupid people to suffer. We cannot fix stupid people. They must be allowed to suffer the results of their stupid decisions. People who make better decisions and work harder usually end up doing better for theirownselfs. So sayeth grudznick.
grud fell off the bus. The only reason that the savings and loan crisis and the more recent housing/banking crisis (Lehman Brothers, Bear & Stearns, mortgage lenders, etc.) bypassed North Dakota was because of the government run State Bank of North Dakota.
The market of selfish fools is incapable of self regulation. Few ‘professions’ are less greedy than those dealing with real estate, thus that profession and those like it require more regulation, not less. Try to get a mortgage when the appraisers are unregulated. Good. Luck. With. That.
Mr. H, this might darken your ears but grudznick does not agree with Ms. Noem on this issue. We need no appraisers at all. The banks also operate independently, and if they make bad loan decisions then shame on them.
I’ve posted twice about grudz’s habitual illeism and dwindling mental faculties (he’s nucking futs) and Bob Newland opined we should not respond to it as if it was human.
Ignore it.
Goats!
grudz – Stogies.
The most impressive thing an appraiser has is their professional license. Fear of losing it is what’s between the continual bribes they’re offered and a fair marketplace.