Our Services

Michael H. Christensen & Associates, Inc. (MHCA) provides the market with valuation reporting products needed to meet their specific and exacting requirements and standards.

Traditional Residential & Commercial Appraisal Reports
MHCA utilizes well-qualified analysts to ensure each report is credible and meets the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP).  Our quality control processes, combined with clear and concise engagement communications, completed by experienced Certified Appraisers, result in reports that meet the highest professional standards and ethics and help MHCA to meet each client’s quality expectations, on every report.  Our fees are competitive and our appraisers are well compensated, resulting in professional servicing that is unmatched in the industry. 

Residential appraisal reporting formats have largely been standardized for more than 30 years, as dictated by Government Sponsored Enterprises (GSEs), i.e. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, etc.  The following residential formats are provided:

• Conventional & FHA Form 1004
• Conventional & FHA Form 1073 (Condo)
• Conventional & FHA Form 1025 (2-4 multi-family)
• Form 2055 & 1075 (exterior inspection only)
• Appraisal Reviews (field & desktop)
• Broker Price Opinions (BPO)
• Automated Valuation Models (AVM)

Non-residential appraisal reports range is format style and depth of valuation analyses required by each client.  Both form and narrative formats are utilized to ensure specific needs are met on every report generated. 

Alternative Residential & Commercial Valuation Reports
Michael H. Christensen & Associates, Inc. has carefully listened to the financial markets and developed the Evaluation Appraiser Restricted Report (EARR), a restricted format appraisal. This cost-effective, efficient, and easy to consume residential evaluation product provides federally regulated lenders with affordable regulatory safety and superior professional analyses.

The December 2010 Interagency Appraisal and Evaluation Guidelines provided very prominent, but vague, direction on the use of “evaluations” for federally regulated institutions for use in their lending practices. Although more detailed communications covering Automated Valuation Models (AVM), Broker Price Opinions (BPO), and appraisals were included, only a few indications of how an institution can use these traditional value and price opinion products in an evaluation were provided. By themselves, neither an AVM or BPO can be an evaluation; however, the “Agencies” made it clear these products may be valuable tools in the development of an evaluation. An appraisal can clearly be classified by the Agencies as either an appraisal or evaluation, although according to the Uniform Standards of Appraisal Practice (USPAP), any opinion of market value offered by an appraiser is an appraisal.

The desire for regulated lenders to use a suitable evaluation product stems from both regulatory and economic necessity. They are simply faced with determining what evaluation product can provide impenetrable regulatory cover, while providing reliable valuation analysis, at an affordable cost to the lender or borrower.  The EARR™ easily meets this challenge and has been readily accepted by the market.


Additional Specialty Services

• Expert Testimony
• Appraisal Review
• Regulatory valuation process audits for Federally Insured Banking Institutions
• "Green" concept building valuation and review
• Solar energy system valuation