Family law, probate, bankruptcy, and civil litigation each put a valuation in front of someone whose job is to find the weakness in it. This page covers how I open a file for counsel, what the work product looks like, what is discoverable, and how testimony is arranged.
Most of my career was spent as a review appraiser. Other appraisers' reports came across my desk, thousands of them, across six states, and my job was to decide whether the work held up. Not whether the number felt right. Whether the support behind it survived a hostile reading.
That is the habit I bring to attorney work. I write my own reports to survive the scrutiny I used to apply. The comparable selection is explained, every adjustment has a stated basis, and the scope of work is defined on the page rather than left for a cross-examiner to characterize however suits the question.
Counsel can engage me directly and bill it through, or the party can engage me on counsel's advice. Either works. The engagement determines who my client is and who is entitled to rely on the report, so it is settled in writing before I begin rather than negotiated after the report exists.
Before I accept, I run a conflict check against prior work. USPAP requires me to disclose any service I have performed on the same property within the prior three years, so send the property address and the names of the parties with the first call and I will tell you quickly whether I am clear to take the assignment.
Three things open the file: the intended use, the intended users, and the effective date. Those three define the assignment, they shape the scope of work and the data I analyze, and none of them can be retrofitted once the report exists.
A past effective date is routine work, not an obstacle. Date of separation, date of death, petition date, January 1 of a tax year. The market data from that date still exists in exactly the form it always did, and the report states the retrospective basis plainly.
Reports are narrative, developed under the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice, and written to be read by two people who disagree. The reasoning is on the page because the reader who matters most is the one looking for the gap in it.
The workfile behind every report is retained for at least five years, and longer while a matter is pending. Assume it is discoverable and assume the other side will read it. That expectation shapes how the file is built from the first day of the assignment, which is a good deal cheaper than explaining a messy file after a subpoena arrives.
If the other side has produced an appraisal you believe is wrong, a rebuttal begins with appraisal review: a distinct assignment that examines whether their work was properly developed and adequately supported. It identifies the comparable that was not comparable, the adjustment with no stated basis, the effective date that quietly drifted. And where the opposing report holds together, it says that instead, because that answer changes strategy too.
Depositions, hearings, trial testimony, and appearances before county boards are separate engagements from the appraisal, billed at an hourly rate with a minimum and arranged in advance under their own agreement. Billing starts when I leave my door, because a day in court is a day whether it is spent testifying or waiting to.
Fees are never contingent. My client is the assignment, not the outcome. I cannot accept work where the fee or the engagement depends on reaching a particular number, and I will not take direction on a conclusion. That restriction is the first thing opposing counsel will probe, and it is what makes the opinion worth putting in front of a judge in the first place.
Delivery generally runs 24 to 48 hours for a straightforward single-family assignment and up to a week or two where the property or the support requirement is complex. Litigation work tends toward the longer end because the support is built for scrutiny, and you will have the expected timeline when I quote the assignment.
I work Metro Atlanta and Northwest Georgia, eighteen counties, from Cartersville. every county the practice covers.
The direct line is 470.642.0232. You reach me, not an intake desk, and the first questions will be about intended use and effective date.
Yes. Appraisal review is a distinct assignment that examines whether the opposing report was properly developed and adequately supported. It answers a different question from a new appraisal, and it is frequently the more useful document in a contested matter.
A review will not simply produce a number your side prefers. Occasionally the honest answer is that the opposing report holds together, and you will get that answer straight, because knowing it early is worth something too.
Yes, and in attorney work it usually is. Date of separation, date of death, petition date, January 1 of a tax year. A retrospective assignment analyzes the market as it existed on that date using the sales available then, and the report discloses the retrospective basis on its face.
The effective date has to be settled before I begin, because it determines which sales are evidence and which are irrelevant. Changing it later is not an edit. It is a new assignment.
Either works. Counsel can engage me directly and bill it through, or the party can engage me on counsel's advice. What matters is that the engagement is settled in writing before I start, because it determines who my client is and who is entitled to rely on the report.
Yes. Testimony is a separate engagement from the appraisal, billed hourly with a minimum and arranged in advance under its own agreement. Billing starts when I leave my door, because a day in court is a day whether it is spent testifying or waiting to.
You will reach Scott directly. Expect questions about intended use and effective date before a fee is quoted.
Discuss an assignment