The New UAD: Easier to Write, Easier to Read

The real estate appraisal industry is about to experience a significant transformation. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have jointly unveiled an ambitious overhaul of the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) to modernize and streamline the appraisal reporting process.

Though this new version of UAD has been colloquially called UAD 2.0 by many in the industry, it is officially versioned as UAD 3.6.

Let’s dive into the details of the new UAD and its impact on appraising.

What’s changing?

A lot.

The familiar lineup of individual numbered appraisal forms (such as the 1004, 1073, and 2055) is going away. Instead, the new Uniform Residential Appraisal Report (URAR) arrives as a flexible, intelligent report. It dynamically adapts based on property characteristics, eliminating the need to select property-specific forms up front. Whether it’s a single-family home, condo, or other property type, the URAR adjusts seamlessly.

Appraisers will also be able to capture more granular details about the home. Each room’s condition can be reported individually, including updates, flooring, and appliances. Exterior details, including information about garages, pools and sheds, are also collected in a robust manner. Separate ratings for interior and exterior conditions provide a more complete picture.

No more additional comment addendum pages! The current reports can often be difficult to read, especially for the average home consumer. Constantly having to flip back and forth between the main form of the report and an additional comments page can be frustrating and hard to follow. The new URAR integrates commentary directly within relevant sections. Appraisers can provide insights right alongside data, photos, maps, or figures. This approach enhances the narrative flow and keeps readers from getting lost flipping back and forth between pages.

Finally, reports now open with digestible summaries of key details. The sales grid dynamically emphasizes useful comparative information between the subject property and comparables. Similarities and differences become transparent at a glance.

When is this happening?

In some ways, it’s been happening for years already. In 2018, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac initiated a feedback program with all stakeholders in the mortgage industry, from lenders to appraisal management companies to software vendors, to explain their goals with the new UAD and gather input from concerned parties. After years of work and back-and-forth with this advisory group, they published the initial specification for UAD 3.6 and the new dynamic reports in the spring of 2023. Since then, all of the technology partners in the industry have been working to develop and implement all the changes this effort requires.

The GSEs have already begun initial testing of the new URAR with software vendors, with that testing period running through Q4 of 2025. On September 8, 2025, a “limited production” phase will begin, where some appraisers will complete some assignments for select lenders using the new dynamic report rather than the legacy numbered forms. “Broad production” will begin on January 26, 2026, at which point any lender can issue an order for a UAD 3.6 report; the old and new UAD standards will exist alongside one another during a transition phase, until the industry and the GSEs are confident all the kinks have been worked out.

Beginning on November 2, 2026, all lenders must use UAD 3.6 for new orders, though existing UAD 2.6 appraisals may still exist in the pipeline. By May 3, 2027, all UAD 2.6 reports will have cleared the pipeline and the legacy numbered forms will be completely retired.

When developing the requirements for the new UAD, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac also worked with their colleagues at the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to ensure UAD 3.6 addressed their needs as well. FHA and VA both anticipate adopting the dynamic URAR after the GSEs do, though they have not announced a specific timeline for the change.

Why does it matter?

The UAD redesign and new URAR simplify the appraisal process, enhance data accuracy, and, perhaps most importantly, improve readability for lenders and homeowners.

In 2009 and 2010, the original UAD was developed to make appraisal reports easier for computers to parse by collecting more standardized data in the 2005 Fannie and Freddie forms, allowing increased accuracy and speed in review and data processing. A computer readable and parsable XML (eXtensible Markup Language) would be delivered to the client in the MISMO data formatting standard along with a human readable PDF file.

The problem was that the PDF file, with its new UAD abbreviations and formatting used to squeeze more information into the existing fields designed for plain text, was very close to gibberish to the general human consumer. A UAD abbreviation addendum was included but this caused frustration for the client. Now they had to flip back and forth between both the additional comments addenda and the UAD abbreviations addendum to decipher the full report.

The new UAD addresses this by collecting the same data as the previous version while creating a more narrative, easier to read PDF version of the report that's much more human friendly. It also frees the appraiser from having to learn and use cryptic abbreviations, punctuation and formatting by dynamically adding sections of the report as they are needed and collecting information in a more familiar narrative fashion.

What will this mean for my workflow?

If one thing can be said about the real estate appraisal software industry, it’s that appraisers understandably dislike any disruption to their workflow, especially changes to their software. But, sometimes, change is unavoidable. And sometimes it can even make your life easier.

No matter which software package you use to create your appraisals, your workflow is going to change. 

Most appraisal software suites present the current UAD forms in a What You See is What You Get (WYSIWYG) format. This means that you see the form roughly as it will be printed and delivered, like a piece of paper, and you “type” into each field.

With the new UAD, the GSEs are leaving it up to the individual software companies as to how they will collect and present the appraisal report data. As you begin adding information into the report, new sections will appear so that only relevant information is collected.

The end result will be a very narrative appraisal report that is easy to read and understand along with the computer friendly MISMO XML data that the AMC and lender computer systems will use to parse, process and make decisions on.

And, in an effort to help reduce revision requests, the GSEs are also exposing the same validation API (application programming interface) to the software vendors that the Uniform Collateral Data Portal (UCDP) uses to check submitted reports. This means there shouldn’t be any surprise hard stops, errors, or warnings after an appraiser has submitted their report to their client – they’ll be able to validate their report against the GSE API before sending it in.

How is SFREP implementing the new UAD?

SFREP has been working directly with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as have the other major software vendors, to ensure the new UAD is implemented correctly and efficiently.

Each software vendor was given the freedom to collect information and display the dynamic forms in whatever way they thought was best. We’ve made a huge effort to keep the editing process similar to form editing with the old UAD.

While some software designers may choose the “wizard” approach to collecting report information, guiding the appraiser step-by-step and not showing the final output report until the end, we’ve chosen to keep some semblance of the what-you-see-is-what-you-get presentation previously used in Appraise-It Pro.

As the appraiser begins filling out the dynamic form fields, new fields and sections will appear as needed. If they reach the end of a text field but have more to say, rather than trip over to an extended comment to continue their thought, the text field will simply expand to give them more room. The appraiser will see an approximation of the final printed report as it is built, which will aid in “report awareness” and make the transition to the new UAD familiar and easy.

SFREP also has a rigorous and extensive beta testing program planned with volunteer users to get valuable feedback and help choose the best ways to collect data and present the form. While we pride ourselves in having great user interface and program design chops, we’re not the real experts. Our users are.

A massive training and technical support program is also planned to get our users up to speed with live webinars, pre-produced how-to videos and expanded phone and chat support hours.

And we plan to do all of this at no extra charge.

No one likes change. Especially change on this scale. But with a lot of hard work, planning and help from software professionals and our peers, we’ll all come out stronger, more efficient and more profitable on the other side.