Yep this sounds like manufactured outrage.
yup
maybe cleaning up the place also made a difference
clutter and packed rooms look worse and smaller than they are
It doesn’t to me. It happens to (white) female homeowners, female proprietors, female car buyers. Stands to reason it also happens to black homeowners. Something is manufactured outrage if there is no quantifiable result over something like an insensitive remark; but this is about a lot of money, too much to be simply a matter of evaluator variation in a neighborhood with that range of comparable values.
In 42 years of commercial lending I have read hundreds of residential and commercial appraisals. You have to read them and assess them for accuracy and logic. Never be afraid to challenge an appraiser on their conclusion, they are infallible.