Strong Appraisal Services upholds the highest professional ethics

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. That's why it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be dubbed a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

An appraiser's primary obligation is to their client. Generally, for a regular residential appraisal, the lender places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers have certain duties of privacy to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you require to obtain a copy of an appraisal report, you should obtain it from your lender. Other obligations also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, attaining and sustaining an appropriate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is is what we do everyday at Strong Appraisal Services.

In some cases appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Typically the third parties are clearly defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is limited to those parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the job.

There are also ethical standards that have nothing to do with clients and others. For example, appraisers must keep their work files for a minimum of five years - at Strong Appraisal Services you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Doing assignments on contingency fees is not something we can consider That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. Another practice that's restricted is doing assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal professions most important rule, because it would invite appraisal fraud since raising the estimate of the home would up the fee. We don't do that. Other unprofessional practices may be defined by state law or professional societies 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," as well as 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 Strong Appraisal Services we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the ethical handling of appraisals that we're known for.