Dear Manuel,

I think the real estate appraisal is a rigorous science, but it is not an exact science.

Historically, property valuations were mere opinions expressed by the owners or any other person engaged in the sale or management of the property concerned. In the complex economy of ours, these "assessments" are too simple, they are not safe and may lead to wrong decisions.

Expertise or evaluation expert, is more than an opinion.

It requires selective research on the market things considered: the gathering of information, the implementation of special analytical techniques, and above all the knowledge, experience and judgment necessary for the development of an own conclusion to the problem . The expert judgment is therefore critical.

Although the same process expertise applies scientific methods, it is not an exact science. The expert compiles and selects the information, applies his knowledge to the treatment of this information, permanently applies a rule of objectivity and high ethics and develops a valid conclusion.

Practice expertise is therefore determine the value of a not empirically well, but using recognized methods to obtain this value from data in both physical, technical, legal and economic .

With my best regards

Prof. Bachir ACHOUR

Very good point Bachir and maybe it is in this regard that Real Estate Appraisal did not make enough room into academy, specially if we consider that Engineers are in a vast majority adscribed themselves to positivism or neopositivism epistemic views (as you remark very well the Kingdom of Exact Sciences).

Maybe Real Estate Appraisal could be enrolled in the scientific rigour of academia if were under the umbrella of the social sciences that have another epistemic values from exact sciences but are still academic disciplines.

Thanks a lot for your contibution to this thread.

Dear Vanessa thanks for upvote the question I believe that this is a interesting way to promote answers. In Brazil exists a group of academics with interest in real estate appraisal one of them is Marco Aurelio Stumpf  Gonzalez

Manuel, I believe you are incorrect in your assumption it is not rigorously studied.  In fact, there is a rich literature tradition.  There is a specific appraisal journal, The Appraisal Journal.  Also, the leading real estate journals, Journal of Real Estate Research, Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, and Real Estate Economics regularly publish appraisal related articles.  I have a forthcoming article at JRER which includes a detailed literature review (The Application of Hedonic Grid Regression to Commercial Real Estate).  Also, to what Bachir said, judgement is involved in every discipline and does not preclude the rigorous study of process of addition to the body of knowledge.

Dear Spenser I appreciate so much your answer and I will look for the journals that you suggest and also will be looking forward for your research contribution. I get also a direct message answer from Maurizio d'Amato that I will share here in a while. He also suggest some journals. It is possible that my assumption or more precisely my claim about academic rigor in Real Estate Appraisal is exaggerated and maybe could be more precisely to make the claim about the relative amount of academic rigorously research in real estate in comparison with other subjects taking into account the importance that I give to real estate as an academic subject matter. In any case I will be glad if Spenser, Bachir or any other contributes also pointing postgraduate studies in their countries or in any other than they can know related with real estate appraisal (specially if it is a major or a minor concentration). 

Professor Maurizio d'Amato answer to my direct request the following:

"Dear Manuel I do not understand why this answer should be addressed by me but I try to answer to your question. I believe that the main problem starts from the non homogeneous distribution of professors in real estate appraisal. In the southern European countries we find professors in real estate in technical university with a background of engineer (it is not my case). In the US and UK school valuer are essentially economist who studied in college of business being overwhelmed by the powerful group of professors in finance. I think that Real Estate Appraisal is a rigorous academic discipline. Probably many government and Rectors think that this is not and the effect of this strange idea can be observed after the crisis of 2008. For the journals I do not think it is correct writing that there are not journals on real estate appraisal. There is Appraisal Journal, The Valuation Journal, International Journal of Strategic Property Management, International Real Estate Review and many others journal involved with real estate appraisal.

Best MdA"

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Maurizio_Damato2

The MAI designation through the appraisal institute is the appraisal specific certification and is quite rigorous.  In academia, I am not aware of a US appraisal focused degree.  However, there are many real estate degrees in which appraisal is a part of integrated curriculum including development, investment analysis, economics, etc.  Berkeley, Wisconsin, Johns Hopkins, NYU, Georgia, Portland State, Washington are among many real estate masters programs.

Thanks again Spenser. All my concerns are because I am involved in teaching and researching duties in an academic postgraduate degree at my University in Caracas, Venezuela: Postgraduate Specialist in Appraisal of Goods and Real Estate and then I am trying to keep top quality by means of academic rigor.

Manuel, you might also consider joining the Latin American Real Estate Society.  The American Real Estate Society (ARES) has sister societies across the globe and LARES is one http://lares.org.br/

You might also consider coming to the ARES conference in Denver in April if budget affords.  It attracts a large international contingent.  We also have a scholarship for doctoral students to attend if your research is real estate related (sounds like a mix for you).  There are a number of behavorial real estate researchers there as well.  I am a board member and would be happy to give you more info if you need.