Eric Allen grew up in Park City, Utah where he was introduced to the housing market working for a rock mason. After college, Eric began his real estate career in 1998 working for an appraisal firm, researching and writing market studies. Eric is the Director for Metrostudy’s Utah and Idaho operations and is responsible for research, consulting and managing client relationships. Eric led Metrostudy’s expansion of the Salt Lake City market in 2001, later opening the St. George / Mesquite market area in 2005, and the Boise, Idaho market in 2006. Eric has over 20 years of experience with the housing market, 17 of which have been with Metrostudy. Eric currently sits on the Board of Directors for the Salt Lake and Northern Wasatch Home Builders Associations, and was the Associate Vice President for the Northern Wasatch HBA in 2007 and 2008.

Metrostudy was founded in 1975 in Houston Texas, and covers approximately 75% of all new home production across the US. Metrostudy tracks all for sale single family and multi family housing, and every 90 days. Company wide, Metrostudy surveys over 4 million lots within a two-week period, every 90 days. Metrostudy’s team of surveyors drive the streets of every subdivision and physically inspect every lot to compile essential information for the housing market including future lots, vacant developed lots, homes under construction, finished and vacant homes and completed homes.

James Baumberger, MNAA, is Chief Executive Officer and minority owner of First Choice Appraisal Management (FCAM). Jim has an outstanding record of providing inspirational executive leadership for appraisal organizations serving the financial services industry. His past positions include Collateral Services Manager for Washington Mutual, Regional Chief Appraiser for Bank of America, Division Appraisal Manager for World Savings, and Mortgage Group Leader for Wachovia Bank.

Jim grew up in Ohio in a real estate family, as the son of a successful appraiser and real estate broker. He was photographing homes, measuring buildings, and attending open houses from an early age through high school. After attending Ohio State University for two years, Jim relocated to Oregon. He later graduated Magna Cum Laude from Concordia University in Portland with a degree in Business Management and Communications.

As a certified residential appraiser, Jim’s 28 years of professional appraisal practice includes valuation services for eminent domain, lending, litigation, marketing, and relocation purposes. In addition, Jim has developed numerous qualifying and continuing education courses and training seminars for industry professionals. He frequently presents customized training for agents, appraisers, loan originators, loan processors, and mortgage underwriters.

Jim knows how vitally important it is that agents, appraisers, and lenders understand the best ways to ensure compliance with the industry’s far-reaching, ongoing regulatory changes. He served for four years on Oregon’s Appraiser Certification and Licensure Board (ACLB), which is the state’s regulatory agency for appraisers and Appraisal Management Companies. Jim provided executive leadership as the state regulatory Board Chair from 2014 through 2016.

Jeff Bradford is the founder and CEO of Bradford Technologies, the leader in the new field of Computer-Aided Appraising. He has over 26 years of experience providing appraisers with innovative software solutions and is a nationally recognized expert in computer technology and analytics. His company introduced the industry to statistically supported appraisals and a superior reporting format–the Collateral Valuation Report.  Today, he is focused on expanding opportunities for appraisers in the valuation space.   His company introduced the industry to Computer-Aided Appraising technology which eliminates many of the manual, tedious tasks traditionally performed by an appraiser. Today, Mr. Bradford is focused on harnessing the power of Big Data Analytics and Artificial Intelligence to expand the appraiser’s opportunities and support their valuations.

Prior to founding Bradford Technologies, Mr. Bradford worked at companies such as Apple Computer, Structural Dynamics Research and FMC Central Engineering Labs. He holds three masters degrees. One in Engineering Mechanics, Computer Science and an MBA.

The Collateral Risk Network, which is made up of the leading lenders and chief appraisers across the country, awarded Jeff Bradford, CEO of Bradford Technologies the prestigious Valuation Visionary award for 2014. In 2015, he was recognized by the Mortgage Bankers Association as a Tech All Star for his work in introducing appraisers to the concept of Computer-Aided Appraising.

David Brauner (Insurance agent) is principal of OREP and publisher of Working RE magazine. He has been involved in E&O insurance for real estate appraisers and home inspectors for over 20 years. He founded OREP/Working RE in 2002. He graduated San Diego State University with a degree in Journalism & Political Science and a minor in English. David is active in his church, where he is an Elder and member of the choir and praise band.

John S. Brenan has been the Director of Appraisal Issues for The Appraisal Foundation since October 2003. In this capacity, John serves as the Foundation’s senior staff contact regarding the work of the Appraisal Practices Board (APB), Appraisal Standards Board (ASB), and Appraiser Qualifications Board (AQB). 

Prior to his current position, John spent 8½ years as the Chief of Licensing and Enforcement for the California Office of Real Estate Appraisers (OREA). In that role, John administered the largest real estate appraiser licensing program in the United States, evaluating applicants for compliance with both federal and state requirements. John was also responsible for California’s enforcement program; educating and/or disciplining licensees who violated law, regulations or USPAP. John worked with local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies regarding cases involving fraud.

John has been in the appraisal profession since the early 1980s. Prior to joining OREA in February 1995, he worked as a staff appraiser and fee appraiser for several large financial institutions, appraising both residential and non-residential real estate covering a wide variety of property types. He also previously managed an appraisal department for a major financial institution. John is a Certified General appraiser, AQB Certified USPAP Instructor, and Professional Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. John holds a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from California State University, Long Beach.

Craig Capilla is an attorney with the Franklin Law Group in Northfield, Illinois, focusing his practice on representing appraisers and other professionals in state and federal lawsuits against as well as before various licensing bodies. Previously a prosecutor for the Real Estate Division of Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation(IDFPR), Craig has the unique perspective of having been on both sides of litigating appraisal matters, drafting statutes and rules that impact the profession, and working directly with appraisers to minimize the risk of running into trouble. He has taught seminars on the appraisal practice and limiting liability for licensed professionals, and has frequently been a featured speaker at appraisal organization conferences throughout the Midwest, both as an IDFPR prosecutor, and again since he returned to private practice.

Peter Christensen is an attorney and serves as the general counsel of LIA Administrators & Insurance Services.  LIA’s appraiser E&O program is endorsed by the Appraisal Institute.

 
As LIA’s general counsel, Peter responds to the claims affecting LIA’s insured appraisers and AMCs, provides instruction to appraisers on liability prevention, and writes regularly for publications dedicated to valuation and legal compliance.
Peter also maintains a law practice oriented to legal and regulatory issues affecting valuation.  He has worked on several of the largest cases in the U.S. concerning appraiser liability.

As LIA’s general counsel, Peter responds to the claims affecting LIA’s insured appraisers and AMCs, provides instruction to appraisers on liability prevention, and writes regularly for publications dedicated to valuation and legal compliance.

Peter also maintains a law practice oriented to legal and regulatory issues affecting valuation.  He has worked on several of the largest cases in the U.S. concerning appraiser liability.

Scott Cullen, MNAA is a boots-on-the-ground appraiser from Minneapolis / St Paul where he has been a Certified Residential since 2001.  He is cofounder and the appraiser half of a partnership in Solomon, a suite of cloud based calculators that use cost data to help appraisers extract depreciation from the market and develop market based adjustments for the sales grid.  Beyond grid adjustments, Solomon supports other assignment results for appraisers like effective age, remaining economic life and site value.  Scott graduated from the University of Minnesota with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration and stays busy as a fee appraiser, supporting the Solomon user base and developing CE classes on the Cost Approach. 

Scott W. DiBiasio is the Manager of State & Industry Affairs for the 19,000 member Appraisal Institute.  Based in the real estate appraiser trade association’s Washington, D.C. office, Scott is responsible for tracking state legislative and regulatory issues affecting the real estate appraisal profession across the country.  Scott is also responsible for tracking and working to influence state legislative proposals regarding background checks, appraisal review licensing requirements, and alternate valuation standards.  Scott also works with the leaders and members of the Institute’s 89 chapters to assist them in developing and executing their state government affairs programs.

John Dingeman, MNAA, a California, Nevada and Arizona Certified Residential Appraiser and registered Property Tax Agent in Arizona, is the Chief Appraiser at Landmark Network, in a national Appraisal Management Company (AMC). He also serves as President of the National Association of Appraisers (NAA) and as the Past-President for the Coalition of Arizona Appraisers (CoAA).  He has extensive experience in the appraisal of single family dwellings, small income producing properties, and vacant land; and as an FHA appraiser he specializes in HUD/REO properties.

Additionally, John serves or has served in the community as Board Member to the Arizona Office of Manufactured Housing, Past-President of his homeowner’s association, village planning committee, stakeholder committee for a freeway project, and Past-President of a charitable organization called Arizona Helping Hands. Dingeman has assisted in the development of continuing education course materials approved by the Arizona and California and has instructed appraisal, assessor, mortgage loan origination, and real estate sales classes.

Mitch Dorius is Vice President of Sales and Marketing for DataMaster.  Mitch is passionate about technology; he is a dynamic technology executive dedicated to making sense of big data. Mitch understands that data is increasingly important to our connected world and the challenge of making data more organized, manageable and, ultimately, consumable.

Over the past 10 years, Mitch has worked with some of the fastest growing SaaS and tech companies on how to manage data in a fast and efficient way, including SanDisk, Fusion-io, Dell, Salesforce, Tencent, Alipay and many others.

Mitch came to DataMaster in 2015 and has brought these skills, his passion and a clear vision of the future to real estate and valuation.

Hal Humphreys, MNAA I tell stories. I am a private investigator, an actual licensed PI.
I help defense teams fight criminal and civil charges. I help lawyers tell better stories. I help journalists find facts. I'm a story teller.

I’ve been a research specialist for years: Real estate research, valuation, feasibility studies, internal audit, that kind of thing. I dipped a toe into the cold waters of journalism several years ago, mostly out of a love of words, language, and storytelling.

Which brings us to Hear the Beard. I've presented on a number of topics over the past several years: From one-hour talks to rooms packed with five investigators, to day-long seminars in front of 500 attorneys. I tell stories.

Craig Morley, MNAA, is a Certified General Appraiser in Arizona, Nevada and Utah having been an active fulltime appraiser since 1984. Craig is the general partner of Accurity Valuation Morley & McConkie, a regional appraisal firm with nine appraisers performing all types of real estate appraisal including residential, commercial, condemnation and litigation valuation services.

Craig was on the Utah Appraiser Licensing and Certification board for 8 years and is the past present of the Utah Association of Appraisers, Washington County Board of Realtors, Vice President of the Utah Association of Realtors and is currently the Vice President of the National Association of Appraisers and the Vice Chair of the NAR Real Property Valuation Committee and serving on the NAR Commercial committed.

Steve O’Brien is currently the Chief Appraiser at HouseCanary, a real estate valuation and analytics firm where he assists in the development of next generation real estate analytics.  He has worked as an appraiser and assessor since 1979, when he began his career in computer assisted mass appraisal.  In addition to presenting and educating on real estate analytics, he has managed several data analytics teams in the areas of valuation and assessment.

Jared Preisler, MNAA has been in the Appraisal Industry for 20+ years as an independent fee appraiser.  He joined the DataMaster team in 2016 as their Chief Appraiser and Director of Product Development.

Jared maintains a pulse on the appraisal industry by teaching, continuing as an independent fee appraiser and training new appraisers.

 He earned his SRA designation from the Appraisal Institute in 2011 and in 2014 became a certified instructor for the Appraisal Institute.  He serves as the Government Relations Chair for the Utah Chapter. He has served as a board of trustee member and Vice President of the Utah Association of Appraisers since 2010 (UAA).

Jared has developed several CE courses for the real estate profession in his capacity with UAA and as a board member of the Utah Chapter of the Appraisal Institute.

Prior to becoming an appraiser Jared earned his Bachelor of Science degree from Weber State University.  Jared owned a remodeling and construction company and home inspection company.  He also owned and managed 64 rental properties, sold plastic injection molding and managed a truck rental company.

He and his wife Lisa have 4 children, the oldest Taylor is recently married and attends BYU as a pre-Med student. Ashley is recently returned from serving a fulltime mission for the LDS Church in Seoul Korea and is now a Junior at Southern Virginia University and part of their Women Soccer team, Bostin is a freshman at Southern Virginia University and a Goalie for their Men’s Lacrosse Team.  Their youngest MyKenzie is in the 9th grade at North Ogden Jr High.

Jared is passionate about real estate; he loves watching his kids play sports, traveling with Lisa, and golfing.

Lyle Radke is a risk manager on Fannie Mae’s Collateral Policy and Strategy team providing subject matter expertise, training, and support to lenders. Shortly after receiving a Master’s Degree from Brigham Young University, Lyle began his career in real estate valuation in New Mexico.  After nearly nine years of field work, he joined the valuation department of a large national mortgage company, becoming manager in 2007. In that role, he was involved in creation of one of the first XML appraisal delivery platforms. Looking for a new challenge after ten years, he joined Fannie Mae in 2013 to work on Collateral Underwriter and other collateral policy initiatives.

Scott Reuter is the Chief Appraiser and Director of Valuation for Freddie Mac in McLean, Virginia. He is a State Certified-General Appraiser, and has over 30 years of experience in valuation, appraisal and collateral risk management concerns. Scott holds a B.A. from The Ohio State University (June 1982), and has completed the Executive Leadership program at Cornell University, Johnson School of Business (Dec 2007). His previous management experience includes positions with Goldman Sachs, Bank of America and General Electric, prior to being recruited to Freddie Mac in 2016. His team at Freddie leads the effort for ongoing development and refinement of property valuation risk management strategies; underwriting products, and establishing and maintaining a credible quality assurance process across multiple lines of business support.  Scott and his team interact with both sellers/clients as well as stakeholders across the appraisal industry to reinforce Freddie’s appraisal quality requirements.

Bryan S. Reynolds is a certified appraiser with thirty years of experience in real property appraising and mortgage banking.  He is an investigator, author, instructor and nationally featured speaker in the appraisal field.  He is certified as an AQB USPAP Instructor, Registered Agent with the TN State Board of Equalization, FHA Fee Appraiser, and a FHA Fee Panel Appraiser.  Bryan is also recognized as an expert witness qualified by various courts.  His articles have been published in the Appraisal Buzz, Working Real Estate Magazine , and USA Lawyer Guide.  He has also published several books including Fannie Mae CU & You, Navigating FHA, and Appraiser’s Guide to Covering Your Assets.  Bryan is a contributing author to REO Appraising and Appraising in a Depressed Market.  Bryan owns Reynolds Appraisal Service, and is a partner in The Bryclan Group property tax consultants, and a partner in Appraiser e-Learning.  His on-line classes can be located at Appraiser e-Learning.com.

Joshua Walitt, MNAA is a certified residential real estate appraiser, reviewer, and educator. As the Compliance Manager for Property Interlink, he oversees procedures, training, licensing, audit, operations, and review functions. His ongoing goal is to increase accuracy and efficiency through sound reasoning and communication skills, appropriate methodology and technology, and proper oversight.

He writes for industry publications, speaks at national industry events and client conferences, and designs and presents education courses. Prior to joining Property Interlink, he provided fee appraisal and consultation services. He has also been recognized as an expert witness in local and federal court.

Walitt holds the SRA & AI-RRS designations with the Appraisal Institute, is a Board Member of the National Association of Appraisers (MNAA), holds a Certified Distance Education Instructor (CDEI) certificate, is an AQB Certified USPAP Instructor, and currently serves on the Colorado Board of Real Estate Appraisers.

Danny Wiley, MNAA is the Chief Valuation Officer for ServiceLink. Prior to joining ServiceLink in 2011 he was an independent fee appraiser for over 25 years. He received the SRA designation in 1992. He has spoken at appraisal meetings and conferences around the world. Mr. Wiley served as a member of the Appraisal Standards Board of The Appraisal Foundation for six years (three as Chair). He also served for six years on the Standards Board of the International Valuation Standards Committee.

He has been recognized as an expert witness in local, state and federal courts, and he has testified at numerous hearings before appraiser regulatory bodies. He has also been recognized as a contributor to major textbooks, including The Appraisal of Real Estate, and Appraising Residential Properties.

Ashley Wolthuis, MNAA was born and raised in the foothills of Ogden, Utah. She began her sales career at the age of 8 when she sold wild blackberries, found throughout the area, to the neighbors. At the age of 9 she diversified her business by selling maps of where the blackberries were located so her neighbors could experience the joys of picking fresh berries for themselves - thorns and all.

Ashley continues to discover all the hidden attributes of a neighborhood, and shares this knowledge with her long list of loyal clients. In addition to being an active real estate agent Ashley is also a Certified Residential Appraiser - giving her unique insight into the different aspects of real estate transactions. Ashley's extensive knowledge of the Northern Utah real estate market has helped her clients in transactions such as purchases of first homes, military relocation, investment and income properties and selling homes that no longer fit her client's lifestyles. Years later, and Ashley has discovered she's gone back to her roots in helping her clients avoid the thorns.

After her stint in adolescent berry sales, Ashley continued her education receiving her Bachelor's Degree from local, Weber State University, followed by a Master's Degree in International Development from the Universitat Juame I, in Castellon, Spain.

Ashley's formal education and on-going continuous education in both real estate and appraisal courses, coupled with her extensive work experience has made her one of the most knowledgeable real estate/appraisal professionals in the area.