You WILL play ball

We've all heard the stories: appraisers often feel pressure from mortgage originators to go along with inflated valuations (see Inman News series on the subject). The Washington Post today offers a glimpse of what it was like to work as an appraiser at bankrupt subprime lender New Century Financial, where two salesmen reportedly strolled through the office menacing coworkers with a baseball bat (an anonymous company executive acknowledges that "the atmosphere in some branches might have been intense at times" but finds it "highly implausible" that such problems were systemic). A charming vignette also deemed worthy of interest over on Calculated Risk and HousingWire.

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