Everything in real estate starts with market value and market values are always changing. They critical factor to doing anything in real estate is knowing how to determine market value, essentially know how to conduct your own appraisal. The irony is that appraisal is not widely understood even among industry experts. I have close friends and colleagues that are experienced brokers and often they dont understand the critical factors to establishing the value of a property. Appraisal is not difficult, it is simple and it is the key to all things in real estate whether you are buying a house, refinancing, lowering your property taxes, investing, etc. Everything is in relation to the market value and the irony is that real estate market values are always changing. So, understanding appraisal and market values is not just knowing, the value of my home is X. The market is always changing so the key is: knowing appraisal and how market values are determined. When you understand appraisal and how market values are determined you will have the understanding necessary to work with your financial institutions on loans and your Assessor’s Office on property taxes. The California Little Black Book and the National Little Black Book walk you through the appraisal process step-by-step so that you understand how to conduct an appraisal and this is a tool you can use over and over again. Once you have the tool, the Little Black Book, you can appraise an infinite number of residences and understand how those appraisals relate to lowering your property taxes.