MetLife confirmed it has agreed to pay appraisers for work done for the bank and left unpaid by the defunct appraisal management company AppraiserLoft.

The company’s Chief Appraiser Sue Potteiger told Working RE that MetLife will pay appraisers for unpaid work completed for AppraiserLoft on behalf of MetLife.

AppraiserLoft closed its doors in October, leaving a reported $3 million in unpaid debts to appraisers.

Working RE, a real estate industry blog reports:

“MetLife Bank is stepping up to pay appraisers for unpaid work completed for AppraiserLoft. Specifically, any appraiser who completed work for AppraiserLoft on behalf of MetLife and was left with an unpaid invoice can contact MetLife Bank for the fees that they earned but were not paid for.

Sue Potteiger, Chief Appraiser at MetLife Bank, told Working RE, “We’re doing this because we made the decision to work with AppraiserLoft. We did our due diligence on this vendor and engaged them to provide appraisal reports to mortgage brokers that we directed to them.”

According to Potteiger, “It’s not the appraiser’s fault that AppraiserLoft didn’t pay them. If an appraiser did the work and we made a decision based on the appraisal provided – the appraiser should be paid. We did pay AppraiserLoft all monies we were billed for. We are paying the appraisers the money they would have been paid. These same appraisers are vendors that we might be working directly with on our fee panel. It’s important to us to maintain an open and respectful relationship with our appraisers,” Potteiger said.

Potteiger explained that MetLife’s stance is a product of “a pretty straight forward philosophy – treat people with respect and keep your word.”

According to reports, the total amount paid by MetLife to the appraisers in this situation is in the five figures, meaning under $100,000.

Read the original report by Working RE.

Written by Elizabeth Ecker