Honesty and Integrity: DM Appraisal Service

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have increased more 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 rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we have a strict ethical code.

We have many obligations as appraisers but our chief duty is to our clients. Typically, in residential practice, the lender places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers are privy to a lot of information, and like an attorney can only discuss many matters with their client. As a homeowner, if you want to obtain a copy of an appraisal report, you should obtain it from your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment's nature, reaching and sustaining a particular level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at DM Appraisal Service, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

Appraisers will regularly be obligated to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, both sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are listed in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is restricted to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the assignment.

Appraisers also have rules outside of boundaries of with whom we share information For example, appraisers must keep their work files for a minimum of five years - at DM Appraisal Service you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Working on orders that contingency fees is never an option. That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries biggest no-no, because it would invite fraudulent practices since raising the estimate of the home would raise the their paycheck. We don't do that. Other unethical 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," in addition to other situations We follow these rules to the letter which means you can rest easy knowing we are working hard to objectively determine the home or property value.

As soon as you request an appraisal from DM Appraisal Service we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the ethical handling of appraisals that we're known for.