What Regulation B says about getting a copy of the appraisal

1. Who owes the copy, and which applications the rule speaks to

Paragraph (a)(1) is quoted below exactly as eCFR prints it. It is the anchor of the section: three later paragraphs refer back to it by name, and the two definitions that matter most are written for it.

The duty is addressed to "a creditor". The sentence names no other party — not an appraiser, not an appraisal management company, not a settlement agent, and nobody on the real estate side of the file. On its own words the copy runs from the creditor to the applicant, which is also what tells a reader which desk the document is coming off.

The trigger is an application for credit "that is to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling", and both halves of that phrase do work. The lien has to be a first lien on the face of the words. "Dwelling" is one of the three terms the section defines for itself, in paragraph (b)(2), and that definition is quoted in section 12. It reaches wider than the everyday sense of the word, which is what makes this trigger wider than it first reads.

What has to be provided is stated as "all appraisals and other written valuations developed in connection with an application". "Valuation" is another of the three terms the section defines for itself, in paragraph (b)(3), and that definition is quoted in section 12. How far the phrase and the definition reach in a particular file is not something this page resolves.

One thing the sentence does not do is distinguish a purchase from any other kind of credit. It speaks of "an application for credit" secured by a first lien on a dwelling and stops there.

The Bureau’s official interpretation of the section settles four things the sentence leaves quiet, and all four are quoted below rather than described. The section covers those applications whether the credit is for a business purpose or a consumer purpose, with an example of each. On a renewal it applies where the creditor develops a NEW appraisal or other written valuation, and does not apply to the extent the creditor uses ones previously developed. “Written” reaches paper, electronic media such as CD or email, and any other similar media. And where there is more than one applicant the notice and the copies need only go to one — but to the primary applicant where one is readily apparent, and the same is true of who may give a waiver.

2. When the copy is due, and the waiver that moves it

The second sentence of the paragraph quoted above sets the timing, and it sets it as a pair rather than as a single deadline. A copy is due "promptly upon completion", or "three business days prior to consummation of the transaction (for closed-end credit) or account opening (for open-end credit)", whichever is earlier. The two limbs are not alternatives a party picks between; the sentence resolves them with "whichever is earlier".

The third and fourth sentences are the waiver, and their structure is the part summaries lose. An applicant may waive "the timing requirement in this paragraph (a)(1)" and agree to receive any copy "at or before consummation or account opening" — so on the face of the text the waiver moves WHEN the copy arrives, and the sentence still describes a copy arriving. The waiver is also qualified twice over: it operates "except where otherwise prohibited by law", and it "must be obtained at least three business days prior to consummation or account opening".

That second qualifier has its own carve-out, and it is narrow. The three-business-day requirement for obtaining the waiver does not apply where the waiver "pertains solely to" a copy of a valuation "that contains only clerical changes from a previous version" — and the earlier version has to have been one provided to the applicant three or more business days before consummation or account opening. Both limbs of that carve-out are in the printed text; neither is a general exception for late-arriving documents.

The last sentence is the thirty-day tail. It reads "If the applicant provides a waiver and the transaction is not consummated or the account is not opened, the creditor must provide these copies no later than 30 days after…". As printed, the thirty days is conditioned on a waiver having been given. Restated without that opening clause it becomes a flat thirty-day rule for any file that does not close, which is not what the sentence says. The words above are the check.

3. What “provide” turns out to mean, and when a document is “complete”

The two deadlines in the sentence above are the whole of what the regulation says about timing. Almost everything a reader needs in order to apply them is in a different document: the Bureau publishes an official interpretation of this section in Supplement I to part 1002, and comment 14(a)(1)-4 with its five subparagraphs is quoted below in full.

The first subparagraph is the one most often missed, and it moves a closing date. For purposes of the timing requirement, “provide” means “deliver” — and delivery occurs three business days after mailing or delivering the copies to the applicant’s last-known address, or when evidence indicates actual receipt, whichever is earlier. A mailed copy therefore carries a three-business-day assumption of its own, sitting on top of the three-business-day deadline, unless there is evidence it arrived sooner.

The third subparagraph settles when the clock can start at all. “Completion” occurs when the last version is received by the creditor, or when the creditor has reviewed and accepted the appraisal or other written valuation including any changes or corrections required, whichever is later. The second subparagraph says the “promptly upon completion” standard depends on the facts and circumstances, and names two of them: when the creditor receives the document, and the extent of any review or revision afterwards.

The last two handle the files that go wrong. Where a valuation has been developed but is not yet complete as consummation approaches, the three-business-day deadline still applies unless it was waived. And where the transaction will not be consummated at all, the copy still goes out promptly upon completion — or, where the deadline was waived, no later than 30 days after the creditor determines the deal will not happen, which is the sentence section 2 reads as conditional.

One more comment belongs with these, and it concerns a file with several drafts in it. For purposes of paragraph (a)(1) the word “all” does not refer to every version of the same appraisal: the latest version received is what is required, with the addition that a revision received after a copy has already been provided is itself provided too.

4. “Promptly upon completion”, in the Bureau’s own five examples

Because that standard turns on facts and circumstances, the Bureau published five worked examples of it — three describing conduct that satisfies the standard and two describing conduct that does not. All five are quoted below in full, in the order the commentary prints them. eCFR sets a descriptive catchline in italics ahead of each, and this page does not quote catchlines, so the quotes begin at “On day 15” and its equivalents rather than at the line describing them.

The instructive one is the last, because it concerns a file with two valuations in it: a completed automated valuation model report held back for thirty days while a deficient appraisal went for review, then sent alongside the revised appraisal. The commentary’s conclusion is that the appraisal was provided promptly and the AVM report was not. Each document in a file carries its own clock, and one waiting on another is what breaks it.

Reading the five together, what moves between them is the gap between completion and sending, and whether the applicant actually received the copy more than three business days before consummation. What none of them supplies is a number of days that is always enough — the standard the examples illustrate is still the standard the paragraph states.

5. How the days are counted, and the definition the rule does not supply

Four counts in this section run on the same unit. Three business days before consummation for the copies. The third business day after an application for the notice in section 7. At least three business days before consummation for a waiver. And three business days after mailing, inside what delivery means. The phrase appears throughout the section and its official interpretation and is defined in neither.

The Bureau addressed that in a compliance aid, and three passages of it are quoted below. The one describing the document itself comes first, because what kind of document this is governs how much weight the rest carries. It is a Compliance Aid, it carries a version and a date on every page — Version 1.2, 25 February 2021 — and unlike the regulation and its official interpretation it is a dated publication rather than continuously-updated text. What is quoted here is what the Bureau published on that date.

On the term itself the factsheet does three things. It states that the Rule does not provide a definition of “business days” for purposes of providing copies. It points loans covered by what it calls the HPML Appraisal Rule at a different Bureau guide, named there and quoted nowhere here. And for other loans it addresses a creditor applying its own reasonable definition, which it says may include counting Saturdays, offering the alternative definition in Regulation Z §1026.2(a)(6) as an example — a provision named in that sentence and quoted nowhere on this page.

The consequence for anyone counting backwards from a closing date is the opposite of what a search result usually implies. The count is not fixed by the section quoted on this page. Two files at two lenders can land on two different dates without either count contradicting the text printed here, and whether a Saturday sits inside a particular three-day span is a question about that creditor and that loan.

6. The waiver, and the two situations the interpretation says it works in

One thing first, because the phrase “appraisal waiver” is used in the market for more than one thing. What paragraph (a)(1) lets an applicant waive is the timing requirement — when the copy arrives. That is a different thing from any arrangement under which no appraisal is ordered at all, whatever such an arrangement is called on a rate sheet; this page is about the sentences quoted in section 2 and says nothing about any other.

The commentary sets out the two situations in which a waiver is effective, and both are quoted below. The first is an affirmative oral or written statement given no later than three business days before consummation or account opening. The second is the narrow clerical-changes route, and the comment supplies the test the regulation does not: revisions count as clerical only if they have no impact on the estimated value and no impact on the calculation or methodology used to derive the estimate. The comment adds that on this second route the applicant still receives the copy of the revision at or prior to consummation.

The qualifier that governs both is not in either limb. It is in the two sentences introducing them, each of which carries it once — the first about what paragraph (a)(1) permits, the second about when a waiver is effective — so it reaches both routes without appearing in either. Which law it points at, in which state, on which kind of transaction, is not a question this page answers.

7. The notice at application, and a wording difference worth seeing

Before any copy is owed, paragraph (a)(2) puts a written notice on the clock. A creditor is to mail or deliver a notice in writing of the applicant's right to receive a copy, "not later than the third business day after the creditor receives an application for credit that is to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling".

The paragraph then covers the case where the file changes shape. If the credit is not to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling at the time of application and the creditor later determines that it will be, the same notice goes out not later than the third business day after that determination. So the trigger is not only the arrival of an application; it is also the moment a determination is made.

There is a wording difference between this paragraph and the one quoted in section 1, and it is visible with both on the page. Paragraph (a)(1) requires a copy of "all appraisals and other written valuations". Paragraph (a)(2) describes a notice of the right to receive a copy of "all written appraisals". The phrases are not the same phrase. What the difference does — whether it narrows anything, and if so what — is not resolved on this page, and no official interpretation is quoted here. It is flagged because a reader comparing a notice against a copy obligation meets both phrases and is better off having seen them together.

8. The Bureau’s model of that notice, and what a creditor may add to it

The paragraph above says a notice goes out and says what it is a notice of. What it looks like is in a different part of the regulation: Form C-9 in Appendix C is the Bureau’s sample disclosure of the right to receive a copy of appraisals, and it is the closest thing on this page to the document a buyer actually receives. eCFR prints three paragraphs under that heading and all three are quoted below, the third being a bracketed line, reproduced as printed.

Two things in the model are worth reading against the paragraph it models. It says a copy of any appraisal will be given promptly “even if your loan does not close” — the outcome paragraph (a)(4) addresses in section 10. And it addresses paying for an additional appraisal for the applicant’s own use at their own cost, which is a different thing from the reimbursement the charging paragraph permits.

Supplement I carries an interpretation of the form as well, in three units, all quoted. It addresses creditors designing their own form, adding to it, or modifying it to reflect their own policies and procedures, and then gives two examples of additions: a telephone number for leaving the address a copy should be sent to, and a notice of the cost the applicant will be required to pay the creditor for the appraisal or other valuation. That second example is where the notice paragraph and the charging paragraph meet.

9. What the copy costs, and what the valuation may cost

Paragraph (a)(3) separates two charges that get run together in conversation, and the separation is the whole of the paragraph.

The first is the charge for providing the copy. A creditor "shall not charge an applicant for providing a copy of appraisals and other written valuations as required under this section". The prohibition is written about the act of providing the copy, and it is tied to what the section requires.

The second is the cost of the valuation itself. The paragraph says a creditor "may require applicants to pay a reasonable fee to reimburse the creditor for the cost of the appraisal or other written valuation" — and then qualifies it, "unless otherwise provided by law".

The official interpretation adds two things the sentence does not, and both are quoted below. It names what falls on the copy side — photocopy, postage or other costs incurred in providing the copy. And it addresses the reimbursement side at more length: a reasonable fee is not prohibited so long as it is not increased to cover the cost of providing copies; a creditor’s cost may include an administration fee charged by an appraisal management company; the paragraph does not, however, legally obligate the applicant to pay such fees; and one example is given of a fee prohibited by other law, a second appraisal required under two provisions named there and quoted nowhere on this page.

Two things the paragraph does not do are visible while the text is in front of the reader. It does not set an amount, a cap, or a method for arriving at one; the word carrying that work is "reasonable". And the closing qualifier points outward, at law not quoted on this page.

10. Files that are denied, withdrawn or left incomplete

Paragraph (a)(4) is one sentence and it does one job: it stops the outcome of the application from switching the requirement off. The requirements set out in paragraph (a)(1) apply "whether credit is extended or denied or if the application is incomplete or withdrawn".

Read alongside the paragraph quoted in section 1, that produces the distinction the shorthand collapses. Paragraph (a)(4) makes (a)(1) apply to a file that never closes. It does not itself set a deadline for that file. One sentence in the section is written for a transaction that does not happen — the last sentence of (a)(1) — and it opens "If the applicant provides a waiver".

So the section, on its printed words, carries a thirty-day sentence conditioned on a waiver and a paragraph (a)(4) that is not conditioned on anything. Both are quoted on this page. How they operate together in a particular file is a question about that file, and about authorities this page does not quote.

11. Delivering the copies electronically

Paragraph (a)(5) permits electronic delivery and attaches a condition to it. The copies required by §1002.14(a)(1) "may be provided to the applicant in electronic form, subject to compliance with the consumer consent and other applicable provisions of the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act".

The paragraph is a pointer as much as a permission. It does not restate what those provisions require; it names the federal Act and cites it, and the requirements stay where that Act puts them. This corpus's article on electronic signatures quotes that Act directly, including the consumer-consent provisions paragraph (a)(5) names, and it is linked at the foot of this page.

What the paragraph reaches is also specific. It speaks about the copies required by paragraph (a)(1). The notice in paragraph (a)(2) is described in its own paragraph as one a creditor is to "mail or deliver", and paragraph (a)(5) does not mention it.

12. The three words the section defines, and the ones it leaves open

Paragraph (b) supplies meanings, and it says at the outset how far they reach: "For purposes of paragraph (a) of this section". The three definitions below are written for the paragraph quoted through this page and are not offered as general definitions of anything.

"Consummation" is the time that a consumer becomes contractually obligated on a closed-end credit transaction. It sits directly against the timing sentence in section 2, whose three-business-day limb runs to consummation for closed-end credit and to account opening for open-end credit — and this definition speaks to the closed-end half.

"Dwelling" is the term that sets the section's reach, and it is wider than the word usually is: a residential structure containing one to four units, whether or not that structure is attached to real property, and the definition then adds that the term includes, but is not limited to, an individual condominium or cooperative unit and a mobile or other manufactured home.

Three comments sit under the first two definitions and all three are quoted below. On “consummation” the Bureau says the thing a reader on a purchase file most needs to hear: when a contractual obligation is created is determined under applicable law, and §1002.14 does not make that determination. A nonrefundable fee does not by itself produce consummation, and becoming contractually committed to a SALE transaction is not consummation unless the consumer also becomes legally obligated to accept a particular credit arrangement — which is the line between signing the contract and closing the loan. On “dwelling” the single comment carves out motor vehicles as another statute defines them.

"Valuation" is the widest of the three. It is "any estimate of the value of a dwelling developed in connection with an application for credit". The load is carried by "any estimate" and by "developed in connection with an application for credit"; the definition is not written around a particular document, a particular author, or a particular format.

What the section does not define matters as much, and because paragraph (b) is printed here in full it can be checked rather than believed. "Business day" is not among the three, and it is the unit the section's deadlines are counted in. Neither is "promptly", which is one limb of the timing sentence. Neither is "first lien", "appraisal", "creditor", "applicant" or "application". Regulation B has other sections, at §1002.2 and elsewhere; this page quotes §1002.14 only.

13. Which documents count as a valuation, and which do not

The definition quoted above is a description rather than a list of document types, and nothing in it turns on who prepared the document or what it is called. The Bureau supplied lists anyway — five examples of documents that are valuations and six of documents that are not — and all fourteen units are quoted below rather than summarised here.

One item on the first list is worth stopping on, because an agent may have produced it personally. A broker price opinion prepared by a real estate broker, agent or sales person to estimate the property’s value is on the Bureau’s list of examples of valuations. On a file where the credit is to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling, that is a document answering the definition — with everything the section says about copies, timing and charging attaching to it in the creditor’s hands rather than in the writer’s.

One item on the second list is worth the same attention for the opposite reason. An appraisal review that does not include the appraiser’s estimate or opinion of value is on the list of documents that are not valuations, and the qualifier is the whole of it: a review that does carry an estimate is not what that example describes. The same shape appears two items earlier — an inspection report is outside the term only if it neither provides an estimate of value nor is used to develop one.

Two features of the drafting keep either list from being a test. Both open with “include but are not limited to”, so neither is closed. And the exclusion list is introduced by a sentence saying that not all documents which discuss or restate a valuation constitute a valuation — so the question stays the one the definition asks. One further line is quoted with them: the term includes any attachments and exhibits that are an integrated part of the valuation.

Where the questions at the top meet the words

The four situations at the top of this page are not answered here. What each one meets in the text is, so that a reader starts where the words are rather than where a search result left them. All four meet one description before anything else, because it qualifies the whole of paragraph (a): an application for credit that is to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling, with "dwelling" carrying the meaning paragraph (b)(2) gives it.

The buyer asking three days out, and the processor describing something signed at application, are both asking about the same four sentences of (a)(1) — the two limbs resolved by "whichever is earlier", what a waiver moves, and the requirement that a waiver be obtained at least three business days prior with its clerical-changes carve-out. The buyer who wants the document before deciding about a contingency is asking about "all appraisals and other written valuations" and the breadth of (b)(3), though the contingency itself is a contract question this page says nothing about. And the buyer whose file died is asking about (a)(4) and about the last sentence of (a)(1), which opens with a condition; section 10 reads the two against each other.

Checking the quotes, and what they do not cover

This page makes one completeness claim, it is narrow, and it is meant to be counted. Section 1002.14 has two paragraphs. All five numbered paragraphs of paragraph (a) are quoted above — (a)(1) in section 1, (a)(2) in section 7, (a)(3) in section 9, (a)(4) in section 10 and (a)(5) in section 11. Paragraph (b) is quoted as its chapeau together with all three of its numbered definitions, in section 12. Nine quotations, and the section is complete on the page. That is what makes the negative observations here checkable rather than asserted: that the thirty-day sentence opens with a condition, and that (a)(1) and (a)(2) describe what is handed over in different words.

Three companion documents are quoted with it and each is complete in the same sense. Under “Section 1002.14—Rules on Providing Appraisals and Valuations” in Supplement I, the Bureau prints seventeen numbered comments and twenty-three roman-numeral subparagraphs beneath them — forty units, every one of them quoted above. Form C-9 is quoted in the three paragraphs eCFR prints under its heading, with the three units of Supplement I’s interpretation of that form beside it. And three passages of a Bureau compliance aid are quoted in section 5. Fifty-eight quotations in all.

How they are quoted matters as much, and two conventions apply to every one. The paragraph designator is not quoted: eCFR prints “(3) Reimbursement. A creditor shall not charge…”, so the quote begins at “A creditor” and the citation carries the “(a)(3)”. Nor is the italic catchline the publisher sets ahead of the text — “Reimbursement.”, “Multiple applicants.”, and the long descriptive catchlines on the five worked examples, which is why those five begin at “On day 15” rather than at the line describing them. Inside the designator and the catchline each quote runs from the paragraph’s first word to its last, unedited. One further piece of the publisher’s apparatus is left out: the source note at the foot of the section, “[78 FR 7248, Jan. 31, 2013]”, which records where the text came from rather than forming part of it.

What is not on this page is named rather than described. 15 U.S.C. §1691(e) appears as a locator only, and nothing here says what it provides. So does the rest of part 1002 — its other sections, the other official interpretations in Supplement I, its appendices, and the nine other sample forms Appendix C carries besides Form C-9. So do the authorities the Bureau names inside quotations printed above: 12 U.S.C. 3350(11), 15 U.S.C. 1639h(b)(2), 12 CFR 1026.35(c), 12 U.S.C. 5519(f)(1), the E-Sign Act, Regulation Z §1026.2(a)(6), the guide the compliance aid points HPML-covered loans at, and the Bureau’s Policy Statement on Compliance Aids, which the factsheet names with its URL. So does the body of appraiser-independence law that comment 14(a)(2)-1 says the required disclosure’s text does not disturb. No judicial opinion is quoted or described anywhere on this page.

The documents behind them are not all the same kind, and the source list below says which is which. The fifty-five C.F.R. quotations — the section, the forty units of interpretation printed under it, Form C-9 and the three units of interpretation of that form — go to eCFR, which serves the regulation as it currently stands and prints an “as of” date for the title; that date is beside each entry, and every quote also carries the date it was loaded. A numbered annual edition of the C.F.R. is a frozen snapshot, so re-reading one returns the same words forever even after the rule has changed; that is not what is cited here. The remaining entry is a compliance aid — a dated, versioned publication rather than continuously-updated text — and its version is printed beside it in place of an “as of” date.

What the page cannot do is apply any of it. Whether a notice went out inside three business days, whether a signature at application answers the description of a waiver, whether a particular document is a “valuation”, and how a particular creditor counts its business days are decided on facts and on authorities this page does not quote. Real Deal Pro, Inc. is a software company — not a real estate brokerage, not a mortgage lender, not an appraiser, not an appraisal management company and not a law firm. For an actual file, ask a lawyer who practises in this area, and for anything touching a licence, ask your broker and the commission in your state.

Wrapping up

Section 1002.14 puts the duty on a creditor, keyed to an application for credit to be secured by a first lien on a dwelling, and what it requires is a copy of all appraisals and other written valuations developed in connection with that application. The timing is a pair resolved by "whichever is earlier": promptly upon completion, or three business days prior to consummation for closed-end credit or account opening for open-end credit. An applicant may waive that timing, except where otherwise prohibited by law — and the waiver itself has to be obtained at least three business days prior, subject to one narrow carve-out for a version carrying only clerical changes. A separate notice of the right to receive a copy runs on its own third-business-day clock in (a)(2).

Two words the section leans on it does not define, and the documents quoted alongside it treat them differently. "Promptly" is given a standard rather than a count in the official interpretation, illustrated there by five worked examples. "Business day" — the unit every deadline is counted in — is not defined at all, and the Bureau said so itself in the compliance aid quoted in section 5, which addresses a creditor applying its own reasonable definition and says that may include counting Saturdays. The Bureau’s own worked example of the arithmetic is quoted with it.

The interpretation is also where the practical edges are: that “provide” means “deliver”, with mailing treated as delivery three business days later unless evidence shows earlier receipt; that “completion” is the later of the last version received and the creditor’s acceptance of it; that a waiver works in two situations and not otherwise; and that a broker price opinion is on the Bureau’s list of examples of valuations. Whether any of it was satisfied in a particular file is decided on facts, on authorities this page does not quote, and sometimes on state law — one of the quoted comments says so directly.

Related reading

• How the Closing Disclosure three-day rule works, and what the creditor needs from you

  Our page on the Closing Disclosure delivery rule, quoted from the regulation it comes from

• What makes an e-signature legally binding

  The federal Act paragraph (a)(5) points at, including the consumer-consent provisions it names

Sources

Every quotation above is taken from the documents below, on the date shown; the explanation around each quote is ours. Statutes are amended and uniform acts are revised — check the current text before relying on any of it.

1. [1] 12 CFR §1002.14 — Rules on providing appraisals and other valuations (eCFR, current as of September 4, 2026) — Office of the Federal Register and the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.ecfr.gov/current/title-12/chapter-X/part-1002/subpart-A/section-1002.14, read September 9, 2026
2. [2] 12 CFR pt. 1002, Supplement I — Official Interpretations (eCFR, current as of September 4, 2026) — Office of the Federal Register and the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.ecfr.gov/current/title-12/chapter-X/part-1002, read September 9, 2026
3. [3] CFPB — Factsheet: Delivery of appraisals, VERSION 1.2 (02/25/2021) — Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, files.consumerfinance.gov/f/documents/cfpb_ecoa-valuation_delivery-of-appraisals-factsheet.pdf, read September 9, 2026
4. [4] 12 CFR pt. 1002, Appendix C — Sample Notification Forms (eCFR, current as of September 4, 2026) — Office of the Federal Register and the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.ecfr.gov/current/title-12/chapter-X/part-1002, read September 9, 2026