Remember the days when appraisers were printing three or four copies of each report and then running to the one hour photo with a glue stick in one hand, envelope and stamps in the other ready to frantically paste the pictures into the report, run to the post office and send out the report before 5pm?
It's a whole new world. And this year we've gone paperless!
I would love to take credit for our company going paperless but I must admit that I entered the 
process in my usual manner when it comes to change... with a bit of kicking and screaming.
Our principal appraiser did the math and realized that the cost of paper and seven years worth of five appraiser's files that were now taking over his garage made it worth the up front investment of second monitors for all of the work stations.
If you're an appraiser that would like to go paperless, here are some tools I suggest:
- Free standing second monitor - Tip it on its side if possible so you don't have to constantly scroll up and down reading legal size formatted paper as much.
- SnagIt - Paperless appraisals would be rather difficult without this tool. With it, you can capture any image on your screen and turn it into a jpeg or other image document.
- Adobe PDF Reader - You most likely already have this program and are quite familiar with it. This is how I save all my comparable properties, land sales, etc.
- eFax - It's about $16 per month, which still beats the cost of a fax line. The only downfall I can think of is that unless you receive a fax from another eFax sender, there is no subject line other than the recipients fax number, so finding an old fax can be a bit hairy.
- Scanner - You will need this to digitally archive your notes and sketches.... It's true the scanner is not dire if you have some of the cool gadgets out there. I understand that I can purchase tools to rid myself of these last archaic artifacts (paper), but I do print out the appraisal request and take it with me on inspections and then draw the sketch on the backside of the request. Ta-da... one less piece of paper to toss.
- Back up system - Whether you back your work up on CD/DVDs or an offsite server, you will want to be certain do it more often (than I had in the past), especially if you have a lap top that travels with you to unknown destinations.
- Appraisal software - Although I have a love/hate relationship with Al a mode's WinTotal appraisal software, the latest version, Aurora does have a nifty ‘Work File' where you can store your digital file research so that it's tied directly to it's corresponding appraisal report.
At the end of the day, it feels rewarding and clutter-free with very little stress that change sometimes brings.
Please add suggestions for paperless appraisals or any other paperless real estate ideas!
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Sara:
very creative post. You make some excellent posts. Keep up the good work.