§ 16-66-213 - Appraisal of property claimed as exempt. - Arkansas Statutes

16-66-213. Appraisal of property claimed as exempt.

(a) Upon application to the justice or clerk by the plaintiff in whose favor such execution, process, or attachment shall have been issued, the justice or clerk, as the case may be, shall forthwith appoint three (3) disinterested appraisers, to be summoned and sworn by the officer levying the attachment, execution, or process.

(b) (1) The appraisers shall proceed at once to appraise the property claimed as exempt.

(2) The appraisal signed by a majority of the appraisers shall be returned with the writ.

(c) (1) If a majority of the appraisers decides that the full amount of the property described and claimed as exempted in the schedule is within the limit of valuation prescribed by the Constitution, then the officer levying the attachment or execution or enforcing other process, shall surrender the property to the defendant. The costs of the proceeding shall be paid by the plaintiff making application for the appraisal.

(2) If the decision shall be that the property described exceeds in value the amount exempted by the Constitution, then the justice or the clerk shall revoke the supersedeas so far as concerns such items of the property described as the appraisers may designate as in excess of the amount of exemption provided for by the Constitution, and the costs of the proceeding shall be paid by the defendant in the action.

(d) Either party shall have the right to appeal from the decision of the board of appraisers provided for in this section. If the board has been appointed by a justice of the peace, then the appeal shall be made to the circuit court of the county upon presentation of a duly certified transcript of the attachment, execution, or other process issued and of the decision of the appraisers. If the board has been appointed by the clerk of a court, then the appeal shall be made to the court by whose clerk the board was appointed.

(e) The appraisers shall each receive as compensation for their services the sum of three dollars ($3.00) per day for each day's service rendered, not to exceed two (2) days. This amount is to be taxed in the costs of the proceeding.