Home Appraisals Change November 2, 2026: More Detail, Possible Delays, & What Buyers & Sellers Should Know
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Every culture has its own vernacular. So does every city. Some of it comes naturally to us; some of it you acclimate to when you arrive somewhere new.
As a military kid, I’ve always said y’all. But telling someone I’m making groceries, casually dropping lagniappe into conversation, or adopting Yeah, you right—no matter how much I may like all three—doesn’t exactly flow naturally off my tongue.
Same goes for one I’ve always liked from Boston: wicked.
As in wicked smaart. Wicked hot. Wicked cool.
I love that little trick in language, where one thing can come to mean something entirely different. Wicked goes from scary to rad. Groovy. Dope. Whatever your vernacular is. The thing itself hasn’t changed. Our perspective has.
And couldn’t we all use a little more scary to delightful these days?
So let’s try it with something about to impact the real estate market. Consider this a little public service on our part: a chance to put a small dent in the collective anxiety around change by telling you what’s coming, what we know, and what you may want to do about it before it becomes one more damn thing to worry about.
Something changes November 2 that may affect the home-buying process. Consider this our look ahead, with enough breathing room to acclimate.
Traffic Jam Likely Ahead
If I could predict with certainty today that there was going to be a traffic jam sometime this holiday season, would you care?
Probably not.
At least not until you were sitting in it.
That’s essentially what we’re flagging here. There may be some traffic in the appraisal world late this year, and perhaps into 2027, until a new way of doing business becomes day-to-day and boring.
It has to do with appraisals.
Wait. Why do I care about an appraisal as a buyer? Isn’t that the seller’s problem?
Fair. Here’s why you might.
Here’s What’s Changing
Beginning November 2, the appraisal industry moves into a new version of the Uniform Appraisal Dataset, or UAD.
And frankly, that was about as much as we knew.
So we did what we do when something adjacent to our business is about to affect our clients: we tapped a trusted resource who knows more than we do.
Enter Alex Shafirovich, local branch manager of InterLinc Mortgage and my go-to VIP lender, who came in to walk our team through what’s changing and what it could mean once it hits the real world.
Here’s what you need to know: appraisals are about to get a lot more detailed.
The new format asks for more specific information about the actual house. Condition can be described with more nuance. Different parts of a property can be treated differently. Improvements made at different times, converted spaces, ADUs and other characteristics can be documented more specifically.
By the end of Alex’s explanation, my reaction was:
Couldn’t that actually be a good thing?
It sure can.
For buyers, it may mean a more honest depiction of what you’re actually buying. For sellers, it may mean a more nuanced depiction of what you’re actually selling.
Think of it as less grading the whole house on a curve and more looking at what’s truly there.
That matters in New Orleans, where our houses have a tendency to accumulate chapters. A beautifully renovated interior can coexist with an exterior that needs work. The kitchen may have been redone three years ago while the bathroom has been doing just fine since 1987, thank you very much.
More detail doesn’t automatically mean more bad news. Sometimes it just means a more accurate picture.
So why are appraisers freaking out?
Not because something truly wicked this way comes—in the bad sense.
They’re freaking out because they’re about to have a lot more to do, without complete clarity yet on what doing it will feel like day to day.
Ever been there in a job? A reorg. New management. New software. A major new process everyone knows is coming but nobody has actually lived through yet?
Yep.
So you’ll probably hear about this. Media coverage. Industry gossip. Well-meaning rumors. And somewhere in there you may think:
Dammit. One more damn thing.
Don’t.
Pack Your Patience
Here’s what seems reasonable to prepare for, and it’s pretty simple: appraisals that require more detail will likely require more time per home to complete.
Makes sense, right? Yep.
From there, we can make a few reasonable inferences about what may matter to you. Big industry changes sometimes give people who were already considering retirement, another job or an exit a reason to finally make the move. More time spent on each appraisal could mean more compensation for the work—although exactly how and where that cost shows up remains to be seen.
And more time per appraisal, combined with fewer people available to complete them, could mean exactly what we started with:
Traffic jam ahead.
Not necessarily. But possibly.
So if you’re buying, give the appraisal process a little breathing room. Ask your lender what they’re currently seeing for costs and turnaround times when your transaction gets there, and don’t create a timeline so tight that a delay automatically becomes a crisis.
That’s it.
Knowing traffic might be ahead is useful precisely because you don’t have to panic if you encounter it.
Sellers: Your Homework Matters, Too
More detail does not automatically mean appraisals are about to get “harder.” For a house with improvements, unusual spaces or work completed over time, more specificity may actually help create a clearer picture of what’s there.
The important part is doing the homework before the appraisal. There is a process for asking that an appraisal be reconsidered after the fact; we’ve used it. In my experience, meaningful changes are rare.
You still can’t guarantee value. The appraiser makes that call. But you can give the house its best chance of being understood correctly the first time.
What Does This Mean for Cool Murphy Clients?
Not much has changed.
We’ve already been putting in the work.
For many of our listings, we prepare a dedicated package for the appraiser. It looks not entirely unlike the Buyer Confidence work we already do, except designed for the person evaluating the property.
No, I’m not going to tell you exactly what’s in it. A girl has to keep some secrets.
The point isn’t to tell an appraiser what a house is worth or how to do their job. It’s to make the property easier to understand before they form an opinion.
When we described what we were already doing, Alex told us we were “light years ahead.”
Apparently we’re Ravenclaw-level nerds about managing expectations and doing what’s within our control to help a deal go smoothly—and Gryffindor enough that we’ve already had the system out in the wild for about six months.
Works for me.
So, Something Wicked This Way Comes?
Maybe. Depends on your vernacular.
There may be some traffic while the appraisal industry adjusts. Maybe things take longer. Maybe they cost more. Maybe everyone acclimates faster than expected and this becomes boring surprisingly quickly.
Either way, this isn’t another reason to stay stuck.
Our job is to keep an eye on the road ahead, tell you what actually matters, tap the right experts when we need them, and give you enough warning to plan accordingly.
Small but important clarification: we said traffic jam. Not iceberg. No need to abandon the voyage.
If buying or selling is on your horizon, ask us what we’re seeing and what you should be prepared for.
Turning one more damn thing into good to know?
Wicked smaart.
Celebrated for her next-level creative approach to real estate, Elisa Cool Murphy is the author of Prepped to Sell: What Works Even When the Market Doesn't. She is an award-winning, top-performing real estate broker in New Orleans and the founder and owner of Cool Murphy Real Estate.
Contact Her -
email: cool@coolmurphy.com
Facebook: @homeinneworleans
IG: @coolmurphynola
YouTube: @coolmurphynola
phone: 504-321-3194
Comments