For honest and ethical appraisals, count on Edwards Appraisals

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 certainly be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by ethical considerations.

We have a great deal of responsibilities as appraisers but above everything we answer to our clients. Normally, for a regular residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including confidentiality for their clients a homeowner, if you want a copy of the appraisal document, you should obtain it through your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, acquiring and maintaining a particular level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is just normal course of business for us at Edwards Appraisals.

In some cases appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are spelled out in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is only to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.

Appraisers also have standards outside of boundaries of with whom we share information For example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Edwards Appraisals diligently adheres to.

Edwards Appraisals holds itself to the industry standards and rules set in place for professional behavior. 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 payment on the contingency of the loan closing. Another practice that's restricted is doing assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers up the value of homes or properties to increase their fee. We don't do that. Other improper 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 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 at ease knowing we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

With Edwards Appraisals, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, professional service.