Appraisal work appears to be picking up, slowly, here in California. The interest in foreclosures has risen and some are being purchased. This has created a little more work.
The lenders have been putting the foreclosures back on the market at an alarming low amount which due to the number of foreclosures has driven the values in the neighborhoods down. This has, in some cases caused additional foreclosures for those who could have refinanced. The values in some of these neighborhood has dropped as fast as they went up during the boom.
During the last turn down of the market in the 80s, the lenders held on to the properties, fixed them up and put them on the market at the market price. This time it appears that they wanted to put them on the market to liquidate as quickly as possible. This may be an effort to reduce holding costs, but I think it has made the foreclosure problem worse by dropping the market so drasticly. It would be interesting to see the difference in holding costs and the cost of the reductions to sell.
This is a point of view from Southern California. What has happened in your area?