Honesty and Integrity: Timely Appraisal Services

Appraising is, by and large, 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 certainly be dubbed a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we have a strict ethical code.

We have many obligations as appraisers but our primary duty is to our clients. Generally, for a normal residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have certain duties of confidentiality to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you require a copy of an appraisal report, you should get it through your lender. Other obligations also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, reaching and maintaining an appropriate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Timely Appraisal Services, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers will sometimes be required to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, both sellers and buyers, or others. Normally the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is limited to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the job.

Appraisers also have duties outside of boundaries of with whom we share information For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - at Timely Appraisal Services you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

We meet or beat the industry standards and rules set in place for ethics. We can't accept anything less from ourselves. We don't do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we can't agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal industries biggest no-no, because it would invite appraisal fraud since raising the estimate of the home would increase the fee. We don't do that. Other unprofessional practices may be defined by state law or professional organizations that the appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also defines unethical behavior 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," in addition to other situations We follow these rules to the letter which means you can be assured we are working hard to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

With Timely Appraisal Services, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, professional service.