Since the economic downturn and well into the housing recovery, real estate industry executives have been blaming unduly conservative appraisals for scuttling home sales. But the gap between what owners think their homes are worth and the values appraisers are estimating is getting narrower. In fact, according to a Quicken Loans index of November sales, appraisers valued home more highly than owners in three-quarters of the metropolitan areas surveyed. Echoing this general trend, Realtors responding to the National Association of Realtors’ October 2014 “Confidence Index” blamed low appraisals for only 2 percent of failed transactions compared with nearly 12 percent a year before.