Calderwood Appraisal upholds the highest professional ethics

By and large, appraising a long term career. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever before. 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 are bound by an ethical code.

An appraiser's main obligation is to his or her client. Typically, for a regular residential appraisal, 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 would like a copy of an appraisal report, you should request it through your lender. Other obligations also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment parameters, attaining and maintaining a certain level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Calderwood Appraisal, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

Appraisers can often have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Those third parties normally are defined in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is only to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the assignment.

There are also ethical duties that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must keep their work files for at least five years - at Calderwood Appraisal you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. We don't do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we can't agree to do an appraisal report and collect the fee only if the loan closes. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal professions most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers inflate the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unethical 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 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," 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.

With Calderwood Appraisal, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, honest service.