When a property owner dies, the home usually needs a documented value as of that date rather than today's. A retrospective appraisal by a licensed, independent appraiser gives executors, trustees and heirs a defensible figure to settle on, divide by, and hand to a CPA.
It is a retrospective appraisal. The report is written now, but its effective date is the date the owner died, and the opinion of value describes what the property would have sold for in the market as it stood on that date.
That distinction matters more than it sounds. If someone died two years ago and the market has moved since, today's value and the date-of-death value can be very different numbers, and only one of them is the figure an estate actually needs. The analysis is therefore built from sales and market conditions contemporary with that date, not from what comparable homes are fetching now.
Ordering one long after the death is normal, not a problem. Retrospective appraisals are routine work, and the passage of time does not prevent a supportable opinion of value being formed.
Most estates need the number for at least one of these reasons, and often more than one.
Property inherited from someone who has died generally takes a new cost basis equal to its fair market value at the date of death. A documented appraisal supports that figure, which is what a later capital gains calculation is measured against if the home is sold. Your CPA determines how this applies to the estate.
Trustees and executors are accountable to beneficiaries for the values they act on. An independent opinion is evidence the figure was not simply chosen, which matters when the people affected are family.
When one heir keeps the house and the others are bought out, the whole arrangement rests on the number. A neutral appraisal gives everyone the same starting point.
Knowing what the property was worth, and what it is worth now, informs whether to sell, rent, or transfer it before anyone commits to a course of action.
Where an estate does file a federal estate tax return, the reported value of real property needs support. Very few estates reach the filing threshold, so ask the estate's CPA whether this applies before assuming it does.
If a value already assigned to the property looks wrong to the people affected by it, an independent appraisal is the usual way to test that, whatever is then done with the answer.
California handles this differently from most states, and it is worth knowing before you order anything. In a formal probate, the court appoints a Probate Referee, and it is normally the referee, not a privately hired appraiser, who values the real property and whose figures go on the Inventory and Appraisal filed with the court.
So if your situation is a straightforward court probate, an independent appraisal usually does not replace that step, and you should not be sold one on the basis that it does.
Where an independent appraisal is the right tool instead:
If you are not sure which of these describes your situation, the estate's attorney will know, and a phone call here costs nothing either way.
About the "six months after death" valuation you may have heard of.
Federal law lets the executor of an estate elect an alternate valuation date six months after the date of death, but only where doing so lowers both the value of the gross estate and the federal estate tax actually owed. An estate below the federal exemption owes no estate tax on either date, so the election is simply unavailable to it, which is the position nearly every estate is in. If someone has suggested you use the six-month date, confirm with the estate's attorney or CPA that the election is genuinely available before commissioning a second valuation for it.
The same process as any assignment here, handled personally from start to finish.
Call or send a quote request with the property address and the date of death. That is enough to begin. If you know who else is involved, such as an attorney, trustee or CPA, mention them so the report reaches the right people.
You receive a quote and a realistic turnaround before any work starts. Retrospective assignments sometimes take longer than current-value ones, because the research is historical, and the quote reflects that honestly.
Where the property can still be inspected, it is. Where it has already been sold, cleared or renovated, the report states plainly what could and could not be observed and what had to be assumed about its condition on the effective date. That transparency is what makes the result defensible rather than a guess.
You receive a signed, written opinion of value with the effective date set to the date of death, documented well enough to hand to an attorney, a CPA, or the other beneficiaries.
Send the property address and the date of death for a quote, or call to talk through whether this is the right step for your situation.
Valley-Wide Appraisal Services provides independent real estate appraisal services only. Daniel R. Nelson is a licensed residential real estate appraiser, and is not an attorney, CPA, tax advisor, or estate planner. Nothing on this page is legal or tax advice, and it should not be relied on as a substitute for advice from the estate's own professionals.
Valley-Wide Appraisal Services does not prepare or file tax returns, does not represent anyone before the Internal Revenue Service or any court, does not serve as a court-appointed Probate Referee, and does not guarantee any particular tax treatment, valuation outcome, or saving. How a value is used, reported, or accepted rests with the estate's professionals and the relevant authority.
Probate and estate procedures vary by state and by county, and the rules described here are general. Confirm what your estate actually requires with its attorney, its CPA, or the court handling it.
