Helena Meier: Black couple sues after they say home valuation rises nearly $300,000 when shown by White colleague

Nathan Connolly and Shani Mott are suing an appraiser and a mortgage lender after their home was estimated to be worth $472,000. After the couple removed any indications that Black people lived there, a second appraiser valued the home at $750,000.

Racial Discrimination Americana

(CNN) A Maryland couple has sued a local real estate appraiser and an online mortgage loan provider, alleging that the housing appraisal they received was unfairly low due to their race, in violation of the Fair Housing Act, after a second appraisal returned a result nearly $300,000 higher.

Nathan Connolly and Shani Mott filed suit against 20/20 Valuations LLC, its owner Shane Lanham, and loanDepot.com on Monday, alleging the defendants 20/20 Valuations LLC and its owner “discriminated against Plaintiffs by dramatically undervaluing their home in an appraisal because of Plaintiffs’ race and their home’s location adjacent to a Black census block, notwithstanding that it is also located within Homeland, an affluent, mostly white neighborhood,” and loanDepot.com discriminated against them by relying on that appraisal in denying their refinance loan.

Black homeowner’s appraisal doubled after White friend stood in for her

According to the complaint, Connolly and Mott are Black professors at Johns Hopkins University who applied to loanDepot.com to refinance the mortgage on their four-bedroom home in Homeland, Maryland, a predominantly White Baltimore neighborhood.

Lanham’s company, 20/20 Valuations, performed the appraisal for loanDepot and returned a valuation that was more than $75,000 below the conservative estimate of valuation which loanDepot had given the couple, according to the lawsuit. LoanDepot denied the couple the mortgage refinance because of the low valuation, according to the complaint.

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“Plaintiffs were shocked at the appraisal and recognized that the low valuation was because of racial discrimination. They told this to their loanDepot loan officer and challenged the appraisal in a detailed letter,” the suit reads.

Gabriel Diaz, an attorney for the couple, told CNN the lawsuit represents his clients’ point of view.

Connolly and Mott later re-applied with another lender, and “whitewashed” their home, according to the lawsuit. This included removing photos of their Black family from the home, and having a White colleague present the property to the appraiser. The suit claims this valuation came back at $750,000, more than a quarter of a million dollars higher than 20/20 Valuations’ appraisal of $472,000… More