Six stops under The house hold the calls that stay yours: Functional Obsolescence, Outbuilding, Vehicle Storage, Subject Property Amenities, Overall Quality and Condition, and Highest and Best Use. Every rating starts blank and stays blank until you tap it, and the highest and best use question and its four tests are never answered for you. In How-to 09, Josh Stalk, Licensed Residential Appraiser (NV), walks all six, plus defects and the ADDD Review.
Where are the calls that stay mine?
- Six stops. Under The house, after Unit Interior: Functional Obsolescence, Outbuilding, Vehicle Storage, Subject Property Amenities, Overall Quality and Condition, Highest and Best Use.
- Functional Obsolescence. Tap None, or each issue you see. Every report answers it.
- Outbuilding, Vehicle Storage, Amenities. Garage Spaces can come off your listing sheet. No storage at all? Tap None. An amenity read off a photo is not in the report until you keep it.
- Defects. Six sections have a defects box. A defect spotted in a photo shows in teal: Keep it, or tap Not a defect. Soundness and what should be done are yours.
- ADDD Review. Right under Photos, and in Sections. Every defect in one list, To finish on top. Tap one, and it opens where it lives.
- Overall Quality and Condition. Your exterior and interior ratings, as you gave them. Overall Quality and Overall Condition stay blank until you tap. Then the reconciliation comment.
- Highest and Best Use. The question and the four tests are never answered for you. Answer No, and a box asks why.
What trips people up?
A blank rating is not a mistake. It is waiting for you. Every rating starts blank and stays blank until you tap it, and the left panel counts it as owed until you do.
What stays yours?
Your ratings, whether a defect affects soundness and what should be done about it, and highest and best use with its four tests.
What do the GSEs say?
- Ratings are absolute. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's Condition and Quality Rating Definitions (v1.0, April 29, 2025, page 3) describe a property "on an absolute basis, not on a relative basis or how a property relates to other properties." More: interior and exterior condition and quality on the new URAR.
- The reconciliation comment is Required. The comment under Overall Quality and Condition (report field 15.010) is Required in the delivery specification (Appendix A-1 v1.4, 1600.0008).
- Highest and best use. Fannie Mae's Highest and Best Use Policy FAQs (September 8, 2026), question 6: "If the present use satisfies all four tests, the appraiser must answer “Yes”".
Want it on paper? The How-to 09 Quick Start has these steps on one page.
Questions appraisers ask
Why are my ratings blank?
Every rating starts blank and stays blank until you tap it. A blank rating is not a mistake. It is waiting for you, and the left panel counts it as owed until you do.
What do I do with a defect spotted in a photo?
It shows in teal. Keep it, or tap Not a defect. Whether it affects soundness and what should be done are yours to answer.
Does AppraisalPilot answer highest and best use?
No. The question and the four tests are never answered for you. Answer No, and a box asks why.
Sources
- AppraisalPilot, Where Are the Calls That Stay Mine? Ratings, Defects, Highest and Best Use, how-to video with Josh Stalk, October 27, 2026
- J. Marshall Hunt and Josh Stalk, How-to 09 Quick Start, one page, October 2026
- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Condition and Quality Rating Definitions, v1.0 (April 29, 2025), page 3
- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, Appendix A-1, URAR Delivery Specification v1.4, 1600.0008 (report field 15.010)
- Fannie Mae, Highest and Best Use Policy FAQs (September 8, 2026), question 6