Honesty and Integrity: Alamance Appraisals

Appraising is, by and large, a long term career. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. 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 are bound by ethical considerations.

As appraisers our primary obligation is to his or her client. Typically, in residential practice, the lender places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including confidentiality for their clients a homeowner, if you want to obtain a copy of the appraisal document, you generally have to get it from your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment's nature, reaching and maintaining a respectable level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is standard operating procedure for us at Alamance Appraisals.

Appraisers can also have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Generally the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is only to those parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the assignment.

Appraisers also have standards outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must keep their work files for at least five years - something else Alamance Appraisals diligently adheres to.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. We have a responsibility not to do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal professions biggest taboo, because it would tend to make appraisers increase the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unprofessional practices may be established 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 accepting 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 rest easy knowing we are doing everything we can to objectively determine the home or property value.

As soon as you request an appraisal from Alamance Appraisals 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.