Second City Appraisal is a real estate appraisal firm specializing in the valuation of a wide range of income producing properties. With a local staff with decades of appraisal experience, we can assist you with any of your valuation needs.
Second City Appraisal is the culmination of the lifework of a multi-generational appraisal family. Andrew Richter, now the President of Second City Appraisal, grew up in the offices of his father and grandfather, hand-gluing photos into reports and quickly progressing to day-trips around the city photographing comparable properties and compiling neighborhood histories and market analyses. Cap rates and cost approach were as likely to be discussed at the dinner table as the Cubs. It was an easy decision for Andrew to join the family firm after completing college, where he trained under his father. He soon became a commercial appraiser himself, and in short time earned his MAI designation.
In 2013 Andrew helped form Valucentric, where he created and led a modern and dynamic commercial appraisal team. In 2017, with 15 years of experience forged in the field, Andrew founded Second City Appraisal, with his father by his side.
Today, Second City Appraisal specializes in narrative reports for a wide range of properties, from vacant land and small income properties to shopping centers and large multi-tenant office and industrial buildings. The team is comprised of specialists with additional expertise in multi-family buildings, senior housing, nursing homes and assisted living facilities, gas stations, and houses of worship, covering metropolitan Chicago and the tri-state area. Second City Appraisal’s clients are owner-operators and investors seeking to value or purchase a property and banks, credit unions, and mortgage companies.
President
Andrew has been working as a commercial real estate appraiser for 15 years, but his experience draws from three generations of expertise. He grew up in his grandfather’s office, filing reports, dropping off film, shooting comps, and rubber-cementing pictures into reports. Andrew parlayed those skills (minus the pasting) into his own practice, which he now leads with his father at his side.
Andrew received his Bachelor of Arts from Washington University in St. Louis in 2002, with a degree in business and psychology. After graduating, he went to work with his father, and received his certified general appraiser license in 2007. He was designated as an MAI, Member of the Appraisal Institute, in 2014, one of the youngest members to receive the designation. Andrew served as an Alternate Region Representative for the Chicago Chapter of the Appraisal Institute and continues to serve on the Education Committee, receiving the President’s Award for his assistance in organizing the chapter’s Tax Appeal Seminar in 2016.
Andrew specializes in income analysis, discounted cash flow analysis, and gas stations with going-concern value, but he excels at valuation regardless of property type. He lives in the northern suburbs with his wife and three daughters, and is an avid Chicago Cubs fan. He does his best to love the Bears.
Chief Review Appraiser
Howard Richter grew up in a blue-collar neighborhood in Philadelphia before moving to Chicago to attend Lake Forest College and then stayed for graduate studies at the University of Chicago. He never left, and the city remains a point of passion and pride for him. Counting fire hydrants and police pull-boxes for the social scientists found a practical application in 1974, when Howard apprenticed to his father-in-law, the owner of Donald A. Engel & Associates, a commercial appraisal firm headed by the first of our three generations of MAIs.
That company evolved into Howard B. Richter & Associates, where Howard served as President for 31 years. As Howard’s professional interests turned first toward teaching and then to mentoring our own staff appraisers, and his personal life focused on trekking three 3 granddaughters around his beloved city every chance he gets, he moved over to Director of Appraisal Review at his son’s firm, Second City Appraisal.
He now focuses his considerable professional experience on growing the company and our staff; and his personal life on the home he and his wife, Patti, have made in Deerfield, and their two married children nearby. He is an avid Cubs and Bears fan, loves live music from opera to folk, and delights in doling out his wisdom to his son, who (selectively) appreciates it.
Our Office —
420 Lake Cook Road, Suite 116
Deerfield, IL 60015
(224) 804-0300
