New federal website lets property raters apply to many states at once.
S. 5639 — Portal for Appraisal Licensing Act of 2026 · Filed by Mike Rounds (R-SD) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Sep 30, 2026 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
The bill tells the Appraisal Subcommittee to build a website. Property raters and rating firms can use it to apply for licenses. They can apply to many states through one system. The website will share background checks from the FBI. It will track school records. States will still make their own decisions about who gets licensed. The website will charge user fees to pay for itself.
Who it affects
Property raters and rating firms will spend less time on paperwork. They will spend less money too. Homebuyers and sellers may get faster ratings and lower fees. States keep full power to approve or reject applications.
One thing to notice
The website will hold private data like background checks and school records in one place. The bill does not say how that data will be kept safe. It does not say who pays if it gets hacked.
From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.
Where it stands
1 cosponsor: 1 Democrats.
- Sep 30, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Sep 30, 2026 — Referred to Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Words to know
- Appraisal Subcommittee — A federal group that oversees how property raters are licensed across the country.
- rating firms — Businesses that hire property raters and manage rating work for lenders.
- website — A place online where people can submit forms and information to the government.
- user fees — Money that property raters and firms must pay to use the website.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (5,924 characters) on Oct 8, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
As of — page rendered 2026-10-20.
“New federal website lets property raters apply to many states at once.” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/s5639/simple Report an error
The week in bills
One email, Sunday: what Congress passed, what it changed, and who paid.
One link arrives to confirm the address. It is used for this email and nothing else, and every issue carries an unsubscribe link.