Rocket and the Justice Department Asked a Court to Help Them Settle an Appraisal Bias Case

The filing

Rocket Mortgage and the Justice Department filed a joint motion on July 31, 2026 in United States v. Rocket Mortgage, LLC, No. 1:24-cv-02915-GPG-TPO in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado, seeking a settlement conference before a magistrate judge, together with a joint motion to stay discovery. The case is assigned to District Judge Gordon P. Gallagher and referred to Magistrate Judge Timothy P. O'Hara. The filings were reported in early August 2026.

This is a litigation-status development. No settlement has been reached, no terms have been disclosed and no dollar figure exists in the public record from the sources reviewed.

The underlying case

The government filed its complaint on October 21, 2024, naming Rocket Mortgage, Solidifi U.S. Inc., appraiser Maksym Mykhailyna and Maverick Appraisal Group Inc. as defendants [6](https://www.justice.gov/crt/case/complaint-united-states-v-rocket-mortgage-d-colo). The complaint stems from a January 2021 refinance application by Francesca Cheroutes, a Black homeowner in Denver, whose duplex had been appraised at $860,000 the previous year in connection with an earlier Rocket mortgage; Cheroutes later intervened in the suit as an additional plaintiff. Rocket had contracted with Solidifi to supply the appraisal, and Solidifi in turn subcontracted the inspection to Maverick and Mykhailyna, whose owner Mykhailyna performed the inspection himself.

The government also alleged that Rocket retaliated against Cheroutes and interfered with her rights by cancelling her refinance application after she reported the suspected discrimination [6](https://www.justice.gov/crt/case/complaint-united-states-v-rocket-mortgage-d-colo). Cheroutes's underlying allegation, per the court's order denying dismissal, was that Mykhailyna seemed surprised she was the homeowner during his inspection and disregarded the improvements she described having made since the 2020 appraisal.

District Judge Gallagher denied motions to dismiss from Rocket and Solidifi on September 12, 2025, allowing the Fair Housing Act claims to proceed. The structure of the claim is worth noting: three parties in the valuation chain were named. Lenders have argued that they order appraisals from independent management companies precisely so as not to influence valuation, and that liability for an appraiser's judgment therefore sits awkwardly with them. The government's position is that the Fair Housing Act reaches the transaction, not one link in it. CourtListener's docket lists no filing after March 15, 2026 apart from the July 31 joint motions, indicating the case had been largely dormant pending the dismissal ruling's appeal window before the settlement talks began.

The regulatory whiplash

Rocket separately sued HUD seeking clarity on appraisal-discrimination standards after the administration rescinded earlier appraisal-bias guidance in early 2025. A federal judge dismissed that suit as moot in March 2026.

That sequence is the substantive difficulty here. A lender facing enforcement under a statute whose implementing guidance was withdrawn has a genuine question about the standard of conduct it is being measured against, and a mootness dismissal does not answer it.

Precedent and status

Reporting on the motion noted loanDepot's settlement of a separate appraisal-bias case, referring to the Baltimore matter resolved in March 2024, as a comparison point.

As of the sources reviewed, the case had not settled: the parties had asked only for a conference to explore settlement while pausing discovery, and nothing in the docket establishes that Rocket has admitted liability. Whether a settlement conference produces terms, and on what timeline, was not established as of the reporting reviewed here.