Encino Divorce Appraisals and the Question of How Many Values
Somebody has asked you to have the house appraised. Depending on when it was bought, one figure may not be the whole of what your matter needs.
This page explains when California values a home in a dissolution, why a house owned before the marriage can require a value at more than one date, and how to tell which of those apply to you before you commission anything.
Secure request form. No obligation. Scope and fee confirmed in writing before any work begins.
How Many Values
One House Does Not Always Mean One Number
Most people commissioning a divorce appraisal expect a single figure for the house as it stands today. Often that is exactly right. Where the house was bought before the marriage, it usually is not.
What California asks for by default
Family Code section 2552 sets the default: community assets are valued as near as practicable to the time of trial. Not the date of separation, which is the rule in many other states. That default is where most matters start and where many of them stay.
Why a house bought before the marriage is different
Where one spouse owned the home first and community earnings later paid down the mortgage, the community acquires a share under the line of authority running from Moore and Marsden. That share is not a flat percentage of the house. It is a proportion of how much the property appreciated between dated points during the marriage. A proportion of movement between two dates requires a value at each of them, and one of those dates is the wedding.
What happens when the older value is estimated instead of appraised
The figures that drive an apportionment are differences between values. If the earlier value is a guess, the difference is a guess, and the share calculated from it is a guess with a decimal point on it. Retrospective valuation is a different assignment from a current one, and it is worth knowing which you are buying before you buy it.
Where the Dates Decide the Money
Three Ways the Question of Dates Arrives
Nobody is described here. Each of the three below turns on a different question about dates, and each is common enough in Encino to be worth recognising before you commission anything.
The house was his or hers before the wedding
The property starts as one spouse’s separate asset. Community earnings then pay the mortgage for years, sometimes decades. The community’s interest is worked out from the appreciation across that period, so the analysis needs the value as at the marriage as well as the value now. Encino is full of houses in exactly this position.
Someone wants a date other than the trial date
Section 2552 lets a court value at a different date after separation for good cause, on a noticed motion. Good cause is shown, not asserted, and what shows it is usually evidence about what happened to the property or the market in between. That evidence has to be assembled before the motion, not after it.
One of you is keeping the house
Where one spouse buys the other out, the figure stops being an argument and becomes the basis of a payment somebody has to fund. Both sides are entitled to understand how it was reached, and a number neither can follow tends not to settle anything.
Independence
What Makes the Opinion Survive the Other Side
In a dissolution the appraisal is read by two people who may agree about very little. It has to hold up for both of them.
The fee is set before the figure is
What we are paid is agreed at instruction and does not move with the conclusion. Neither spouse can improve their position by being the one who called us.
The dates and the readers are settled at the start
Which dates the report values, and who is entitled to rely on it, are fixed before any analysis begins. Both are part of the assignment rather than decisions made once the numbers are in view.
Reasoning either side can follow
The sales relied on, the adjustments applied and the reasoning between them are set out so that the other spouse, their counsel or another appraiser can follow the argument and say precisely where they disagree.
A standard neither spouse can move
The framework is USPAP — the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice — and neither party had any hand in choosing it. That is the point of it here. When two people disagree about almost everything, the method used to reach the figure should not be one more thing on the table.
The WCE Difference
We Will Tell You When One Value Is Enough
Plenty of dissolutions need a single current figure and nothing more. If yours is one of them we will say so, and you will pay for one appraisal. The reason this page explains apportionment at all is that nobody else does, and a household that never hears about it cannot ask the question.
The Process
Settling the Dates Before Anything Else Happens
A valuation built around specific dates is assembled date-first. Everything else follows from settling those.
We establish which dates your matter turns on
We agree who is entitled to rely on the report
We gather the records the marriage itself generated
We see the property as it is today and work backwards from there
We build separate evidence for every date in play
The finished report goes to whoever was agreed at the outset
Old paperwork is worth more than people expect
Purchase documents, refinance records, permits and anything showing what the property was like years ago all change what a retrospective analysis can rest on. Much of it exists only in a drawer in the house.
Questions
Questions We Are Asked in Dissolutions
When does California value the house in a divorce?
Family Code section 2552 sets the default at a value as near as practicable to the time of trial. That is different from many other states, where the date of separation governs.
Can the valuation date be moved?
The court may value all or part of the estate at a date after separation and before trial where there is good cause, requested by noticed motion. Whether that applies to your matter is a question for your attorney; what we can do is supply the valuation evidence such a request usually rests on.
Why would one house need more than one appraisal?
Where the home was owned by one spouse before the marriage and community earnings paid down the loan, the community’s share is worked out from the appreciation between dated points rather than from today’s value alone. Establishing that appreciation requires a value at the earlier date as well.
Can a property really be appraised as at a date years ago?
Yes. A retrospective valuation uses the evidence available as at that date rather than today’s. It is a recognised assignment type with its own scope, and it is developed date-first rather than worked backwards from a current figure.
Who is the report written for?
The intended users are agreed at instruction and named in the report. That matters more in a dissolution than elsewhere, because a report developed for one spouse alone is not automatically addressed to the court or to the other side.
Can we instruct you jointly?
Yes, and it is often the cheaper and calmer route. A single appraisal both parties have agreed to commission removes one argument from the matter entirely. Where the parties prefer separate experts we work the same way.
What does the household need to provide?
Access to the property, and whatever paperwork exists about its history — purchase and refinance documents, permits, records of work done. For a retrospective date the paperwork matters more than it does for a current one.
Can both sides rely on one report?
Where we are jointly instructed and both parties are named as intended users, yes. That is settled at the start rather than afterwards, which is why the question is worth asking before the work begins.
We are working out a buy-out. Is that the same appraisal?
Usually it is a current value, and often that is all that is needed. Where the house predates the marriage, the buy-out figure and the community share are two different calculations resting on different dates.
Is the whole of Encino covered?
Yes, together with the neighbouring valley communities. Houses held for decades turn up across the entire area, which is exactly the condition that raises the question of a second dated value, so the same approach applies wherever the property sits.
When You Need One
What an Independent Valuation Is Asked to Settle
To establish the value the division starts from
A current opinion of value near the time of trial, which is what section 2552 sets as the default and what most matters need first.
To establish a value at the date of the marriage
Where the house predates the marriage, the earlier value is half of the arithmetic that decides the community’s share, and it cannot be recovered from a current appraisal.
To support a request to value at a different date
Moving the valuation date requires good cause shown to the court. Evidence about the property and the market between the two dates is what makes that argument rather than asserts it.
To settle a buy-out on a figure both sides can check
Where one spouse keeps the house, the number funds a real payment. An opinion whose reasoning is visible is far more likely to be accepted than one that arrives as a conclusion.
To replace two competing estimates with one analysis
Where each side has produced its own figure, an independent valuation with a stated scope and named evidence gives the matter something to work from rather than something else to argue about.
Service Area
Why Tenure Matters More Here Than Elsewhere
Encino is a long-tenure market. Houses here are frequently held for decades, passed through refinances, extended, and lived in far longer than the national average. A great many of them were bought before the marriage that is now ending.
That is the condition under which a second dated value stops being optional. A neighbourhood of recent purchases rarely raises the question at all; a neighbourhood of long ownership raises it constantly.
We work across Encino and the surrounding valley. The map orients the ground rather than marking the edge of where we will travel.
Resources
Useful Before You Commit to Anything
The Resource Hub
Guidance written for attorneys, fiduciaries and paralegals who commission valuations as part of a wider matter.
What’s It Worth
A plain explanation of how a property valuation is arrived at, for readers who want the reasoning before they want a quote.
The Preparation Guide
What to gather before an inspection, and why each item changes what the analysis can rely on.
Coverage
Other Cities We Cover
Cities
Request Your Encino Divorce Appraisal
Tell us the property and the dates your matter turns on. If one current value is all you need, we will say so before you commit to anything more. Scope, dates and fee are put in writing and agreed before the work starts.
Secure request form. No obligation. Scope and fee confirmed in writing before any work begins.
