My husband and I have had an interesting experience and wondering if others have had the same. (Formerly BS7, you’ll see

[AbuHossam]

Hubby and I paid off our first home in 2022. We have saved up for the past year to upgrade houses to a better ******** and back to where we grew up. We were able to qualify for a new home loan without making our previous home sale contingent on the purchase of our new home. This allowed us to own 2 houses for some short amount of time and make us more competitive buyers. We closed on our new home and love it. Here’s the problem:

Our old home listed at $369k, and went under contract at $403k. It only appraised at $375k. Our realtor was shocked. We trust him as he is top 1% in our state and we used him to buy this house years ago. He filed for them to reconsider but they didn’t budge. The contract fell through. Before the appraisal came back, the potential buyers agent even poked fun at our realtor for listing the house “sooo much” below value. They thought they got a steal at $403k.*

Our realtor was able to get us under contract at the same price and this time the house appraised at $387k. The reason given by the appraiser is the age of the home (build in 1920). Apparently some new legislation passed to impact appraisals on older homes despite upgrades. Has anyone heard of this or experienced this?

Some additional information: we owe $468k on our new home and were hoping to put $320k from the proceeds of this home onto our loan.

This is all so frustrating as we had/have multiple offers above what it is appeasing for. Unfortunately, no cash offers at that amount. The stress of going back and forth with these offers is taking a toll on my husband and I as we have never experienced anything like this before. What are everyone’s thoughts? Any guidance is appreciated.