Honesty and Integrity: Purdy Appraisal

By and large, appraising a long term career. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. That's why it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

For an appraiser the chief responsibility is to their client. Generally, in residential practice, 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 want to review an appraisal report, you should get it through your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate figures appropriate to the scope of the report, attaining and maintaining a certain level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is is what we do everyday at Purdy Appraisal.

Appraisers will frequently need to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are spelled out in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is limited 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 backup their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Purdy Appraisal takes very seriously.

We meet or beat the industry standards and mandates set in place for ethics. We refuse to 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 the fee only if the loan closes. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal professions most important rule, 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 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 diligently 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.

When you order an appraisal from Purdy Appraisal 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.