I've had very good experiences with AOPA - US Alliance for financing my 170B.
When they came up with a Vref value of 39K and knowing it was worth WAY more with all the modifications, they located and recommended me hiring a certified aircraft appraiser who was able to put an accurate value on the airplane making numbers for the loan work out to my benefit.
The appraisal was $600 but exceptionally thorough,12 pages of addressing every possible aspect of the aircraft condition, modifications and logbooks and money well spent.

I've looked up Vref prices for airplanes before & IMHO they can be way off.
Washington charges a state "use tax" (aka sales tax) when you buy an airplane,
and they have an aircraft blue book of values that has seemed pretty close to the mark on the last two airplanes I bought. Dunno how to get a copy though.
In 2008 it was an actual book, in 2014 it was on their computer.

I, too, am using AOPA Aircraft Finance with US Alliance. It's been a very smooth process so far. I'm on my last "hoop" to jump through, and that's insurance.

That's the one thing I'm here to write about. US Alliance has a policy that your insurance deductible can't be higher than 2% of the property coverage value. Since I'm buying a Maule, the underwriter gave me a $2500 in-motion deductible on my policy, which was too high for their lending policy. I was able to negotiate with the underwriter to get it lowered to $1500, so I got lucky.

Keep that one in mind as you're making your choice!

~Chris

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