The Appraisal Report Is Changing on November 2: What Agents, Buyers, and Sellers Need to Know

Two weeks from today, on November 2, 2026, the appraisal report that has anchored nearly every conventional home loan for the last twenty years gets retired. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are replacing the familiar 1004 and its sister forms with a single new report built on a data standard called UAD 3.6. The appraisers I follow are calling it the biggest change of their careers, and several are warning about slower reports while everyone learns the new system. Here is what is changing, why it could affect your closing date, and what I am doing about it on my files.

What is actually changing

Today an appraiser picks a form based on the property: the 1004 for a house, the 1073 for a condo, the 1025 for a two to four unit building, and so on. Starting November 2, one dynamic report, officially the redesigned Uniform Residential Appraisal Report (most people just say "the new URAR"), replaces all of them for conventional loans. The report reshapes itself to the property type, runs 25 to 30 pages, and relies on dropdown fields instead of the free text appraisers have used for decades. There is no more general addendum where an appraiser could explain things in a paragraph; the analysis has to land in a specific field.

A few of the changes matter directly to agents and their clients:

• Square footage follows the ANSI standard. Gross living area is measured to ANSI Z765 and split four ways: finished and unfinished, above grade and below grade. A finished basement is reported separately from the living area upstairs, and finished space that does not meet the ANSI ceiling height rule goes in its own line. The number on the report may not match the MLS or the county record, and that is expected.
• Condition and quality are rated inside and outside separately, and condition is rated room by room. Documented upgrades with dates help the appraiser support a better rating.
• ADUs, additions, energy features, and broadband get dedicated fields. A permitted ADU is no longer a sentence in an addendum; it has its own section with its own data.
• Comps the appraiser considered but did not use are listed, with the reason each was set aside. This "Additional Sales Analyzed" section is new, and it is going to be the starting point for every value rebuttal from here on.

Why appraisers expect delays

The form is new, the software is new, and the validation is automated. An appraiser's software now runs an error check at sign off and will not let a report through with missing or conflicting fields. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's portal will reject new format reports that do not comply. In one industry survey, 68 percent of appraisers had taken some training on the new standard but only 26 percent said they felt well prepared.

The early numbers back up the concern. Clear Capital, one of the larger appraisal management companies, reported in October that fees on new format reports are running about $65 higher per report in markets with enough volume to compare, and that turn times rose at first. The encouraging part: appraisers get noticeably faster with repetition, and most describe the learning curve leveling off after roughly ten reports. The problem is that most of the industry has not done ten yet. A lot of lenders waited until the last weeks of October to start, which is exactly the rush the appraisal community has been warning about.

Two more wrinkles. A report started on the old form cannot be converted to the new one, or the other way around; a wrong format start means a new report. And on September 30, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac quietly announced a temporary exception that lets lenders who are not ready keep using the old form into 2027. That sounds like relief, and for some lenders it is, but it also means appraisers will be juggling two formats for months, and which form your appraisal lands on now depends on the lender, not the property.

What it means for a purchase contract

The practical effect for buyers and agents is about timelines. If you are writing offers in late October through the end of the year, I would plan for the appraisal to take longer than it did this summer and build that into the contingency period. I would also want the appraisal ordered in the first days of escrow, not after inspections are done. And I would ask one question of any lender before the offer goes in: which appraisal form are you using right now, and have you already closed loans on it? A lender that has been using the new report since the spring is in a very different spot than one placing its first order in November.

Sellers can help themselves, too. A list of improvements with dates and approximate cost gives the appraiser what the new room by room condition ratings reward. Details on any ADU, addition, or outbuilding (permits, size, year) now have a place to go. And it is worth setting the square footage expectation early, since an ANSI measurement can come in different from what the listing says.

If the value comes in low, read the report differently than you used to. The Additional Sales Analyzed section tells you which comparable sales the appraiser looked at and why they were set aside. That is where a rebuttal starts now, instead of guessing which comps were missed.

How I am handling it on my files

I am a broker, which means I place each loan with one of several wholesale lenders rather than one bank. This season that is an advantage. Before an appraisal is ordered, I confirm which form the lender is using and whether they are ready on it. If a lender is still getting its footing, I can place the file with one that is not, as long as that decision happens before the order goes in. Once an appraisal is ordered I keep the file where it is, because a transfer can mean a format mismatch and a brand new report.

Beyond that: appraisals go out on day one of escrow, I give agents a realistic turn time instead of a hopeful one, and when a value comes in short I build the rebuttal from the comps considered section. None of that is complicated. It just has to be deliberate for the next few months.

What about FHA, VA, and other loan types?

FHA updated its systems in the spring to accept the new report but has not set a mandatory date, so for now FHA appraisals can arrive on either form depending on the lender. VA uses its own portal and has not announced a timeline. USDA has not announced one either. Jumbo, Non-QM, and portfolio loans follow each investor's own rules, and several wholesale lenders are currently excluding those loan types from the new form entirely. If you are working a government or jumbo deal, do not assume anything; ask.

The bottom line

The new appraisal report is a real improvement in the long run. Cleaner data, consistent measurements, and a clear record of which comps were considered will make values easier to understand and easier to challenge. The transition is the hard part, and it lands right on top of the holiday season. Pad your appraisal contingencies, get the order in early, know which form your lender is on, and prep your sellers with their upgrade list. If you have a deal in escrow right now and want a second opinion on the timeline, send me the address and I will tell you what to expect.