The Appraisers Office maintains the highest professional ethics

By and large, appraising a long term career. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can definitely be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. As with any profession we must follow strict ethical considerations.

We have quite a few responsibilities as appraisers but our main duty is to our clients. Typically, in residential practice, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including keeping many matters private for their clients a homeowner, if you require to obtain a copy of an appraisal report, you normally have to obtain it through your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment parameters, attaining and sustaining a respectable level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics is just normal course of business for us at The Appraisers Office.

Appraisers can also have fiduciary obligations to third parties, such as homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are listed in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is only to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the assignment.

There are also ethical rules that have nothing to do with clients and others. For example, appraisers must store their work files for at least five years - something else The Appraisers Office diligently adheres to.

We demand the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. Working on assignments that contingency fees is not something we can consider That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and collect the fee only if the loan closes. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal professions biggest taboo, because it would tend to make appraisers raise the value of homes or properties to increase their fee. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other improper practices may be defined by state law or professional organizations to which an appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also defines a violation in ethics as the acceptance of an assignment that is contingent on "the reporting of a pre-determined result (e.g., opinion of value)," "a direction in assignment results that favors the cause of the client," "the amount of a value opinion," in addition to other situations We follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are going above and beyond to objectively determine the home or property value.

As soon as you order an appraisal from The Appraisers Office we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the an ethical approach with appraisals that we're known for.