When a VA Appraisal Comes in Low: What Happened at Huntsville Court

If you have been following this series, you already know that 2022 W. Huntsville Court in Broken Arrow was a for sale by owner listed at $550,000 that my buyers and I got under contract at $510,000 with all the furniture included. You know the seller was working off a builder's floor plan that showed 2,900 square feet when the actual MLS-verified square footage was 2,260. You know that square footage error created a pricing problem that was always going to surface.

It surfaced with the appraiser.

This was a VA loan, which means the appraisal process has its own set of rules and its own timeline. VA appraisers are assigned through a rotation system. You do not get to choose your appraiser and neither does the lender. Whoever gets assigned is whoever shows up, and their job is to find enough comparable sales to support the contract price.

At $510,000 for a 2,260 square foot home in that part of Broken Arrow, finding those comps was not straightforward. The home had a pool, an outdoor living space, a gazebo, a hot tub, a horseshoe pit, and Pottery Barn furniture throughout. It was genuinely one of a kind in its immediate area. And one of a kind homes are the hardest homes to appraise.

What Most Sellers Do Not Know About the Appraisal Process

Can a seller's agent communicate directly with a VA appraiser?

Yes, and in situations where the appraiser is struggling to find comparable sales, that communication can be the difference between a deal that closes and a deal that falls apart.

Most sellers and even some agents believe the appraisal process is a black box. The appraiser goes out, measures the home, pulls some sales, and comes back with a number. You either accept it or you fight it after the fact through a formal Reconsideration of Value process.

That is not always how it works.

In this case, the appraiser reached out to me directly. He told me he was having difficulty finding comparable sales to support the contract price. That is a professional courtesy that experienced appraisers sometimes extend when they are working on a genuinely unique property. He was not asking me to do his job. He was opening a window for collaboration before he finalized a number that would have been very hard to recover from after the fact.

That window was three days.

What I Did With Three Days

What does it actually take to find comparable sales for a unique home in Broken Arrow?

Finding defensible comparable sales for a home with unusual features requires going beyond the standard search radius and identifying properties that match on the features that matter most to value, in this case the pool, the lot, the year built, and the overall finish level.

I spent more than an hour searching for comparable sales. Not because I could not find homes that had sold in Broken Arrow. Because I needed to find homes that had sold with pools, with similar square footage, with similar construction quality, and at a price point that would support $500,000.

The standard appraisal search radius is typically one mile. Within one mile of Huntsville Court there was not enough to work with. So I went further. I pulled sales that were similar in every way that matters to an appraiser. Pool. Square footage. Year built. Neighborhood character. Finish level. I found three that held up.

I sent them straight to the appraiser. No lender in the middle, no formal process, no waiting. Just a direct conversation between two professionals trying to solve the same problem.

Three days later he came in at $500,000.

The sellers agreed to include all of the furniture to bridge the remaining $10,000 gap between the appraised value and the contract price. My buyers got a fully furnished home with a pool and a hot tub at the end of a cul-de-sac in Broken Arrow for $500,000. And the deal closed.

What This Means for Sellers Listing Unique Homes

The lesson here is not that you should expect your appraiser to call you. Most of the time they will not. The formal process exists for a reason and it works in straightforward transactions.

The lesson is that unique homes require agents who know how to find comps in non-standard situations. If your home has a pool, a guest house, a significant outdoor living space, an unusual lot, or any feature that sets it apart from the majority of homes in your neighborhood, your list price needs to be built on comparable sales that reflect those features from the very beginning.

Not after the appraisal comes in short. Before you list.

The square footage error at Huntsville Court made the appraiser's job harder than it needed to be. If the home had been marketed at its correct square footage from the start, the price per square foot would have been different, the comps would have been easier to find, and the appraiser would not have been making phone calls three days before his deadline.

Preparation at the listing stage is what prevents appraisal problems at the contract stage. That is the through line of every post in this series.

If you are getting ready to list a home in Broken Arrow, Tulsa, Bixby, Jenks, or anywhere in the surrounding area and your home has features that make it genuinely unique, let us talk before you price it. Book a strategy conversation at https://link.cncsdirect.com/widget/booking/2BPftOW1aYttaxdttERz and we will figure out where the comps are before the appraiser has to go looking for them.

Book a time with me at Legacy Coaching Solutions if you are ready to take your dreams to the next level and make them a reality.

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FAQ: What Tulsa Area Sellers Ask About Appraisals

What happens if a VA appraisal comes in below the contract price?

When a VA appraisal comes in below the contract price, the buyer cannot be required to pay the difference out of pocket the way a conventional buyer might, which means the seller, the buyer, and their agents have to find another way to bridge the gap or the deal falls apart.

VA loans have specific rules about appraisal gaps that differ from conventional financing. A VA buyer cannot waive the appraisal contingency the way some conventional buyers do in competitive markets. If the appraised value is lower than the contract price, the options are a price reduction, a seller concession, a combination of both, or termination of the contract. In the Huntsville Court transaction, the sellers included all of the furniture to bridge the $10,000 gap between the $500,000 appraised value and the $510,000 contract price. That creative solution kept the deal alive without a formal price reduction.

How far can an appraiser go outside the standard search radius to find comparable sales?

There is no hard rule on how far an appraiser can expand their search radius, but they must be able to justify why comparable sales within the standard area were insufficient and why the properties they selected outside that area are genuinely comparable.

This is where the research I did in three days mattered. The three comps I found were not just geographically close enough. They were comparable in the ways that count. Pool. Similar square footage. Similar year built. Similar finish level. An appraiser cannot use a comp just because it sold at the right price. It has to actually be comparable. Finding properties that meet that standard outside the standard radius takes time and market knowledge that most sellers do not have and should not have to develop on their own.

Should sellers be involved in the appraisal process?

Sellers are not typically present during the appraisal inspection itself, but their listing agent should be prepared to provide the appraiser with relevant information about the home's features, recent updates, and any comparable sales that support the list price.

Your agent does not do the appraiser's job. But your agent should know your home well enough to make sure the appraiser has everything they need to do their job accurately. That includes a list of updates and improvements, any relevant permits, and a set of comparable sales that reflect your home's unique features. At Huntsville Court that preparation happened reactively because the square footage situation complicated things from the start. The goal for every listing I take is to make sure it happens proactively so we are never waiting on a phone call.

3-2-1 Takeaway

3 Things to Remember

• The appraisal process does not have to be adversarial. When an appraiser reaches out before finalizing a value, that is an opportunity for professional collaboration, and an experienced agent knows how to use it.

• Unique homes require unique comp research. If your home has a pool, a large lot, or any feature that sets it apart, your agent needs to know where the comparable sales are before the appraiser goes looking for them under deadline.

• Preparation at the listing stage prevents appraisal problems at the contract stage. The square footage error at Huntsville Court made every subsequent step harder than it needed to be. Getting the foundation right from the beginning changes the entire transaction.

2 Questions Worth Asking

• Does your listing agent have experience finding comparable sales for homes with pools, unique lots, or other features that fall outside the standard neighborhood profile?

• If an appraiser called your agent today and said they were struggling to support your contract price, would your agent know what to do in the next three days?

1 Thing to Do Next

If your home has features that make it unique, the time to find the comps is before you list, not after the appraiser calls. Book a strategy conversation with me at https://link.cncsdirect.com/widget/booking/2BPftOW1aYttaxdttERz and we will build your pricing on a foundation that holds up all the way to closing.

As my favorite mentor Brian Buffini says, Education without implementation is only entertainment. — Jennifer Mount, Legacy Realty Advisors

This post is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or financial advice. MLS data sourced from MLS Technology INC. All figures are approximate. Please consult with a licensed real estate professional before making any decisions related to buying or selling property.