Honesty and Integrity: Salt River Valley Appraisals

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever in the past. That's why it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can definitely be dubbed a profession rather than a trade. As with any profession we have a strict ethical code.

For an appraiser the chief obligation is to their client. More often than not, for a standard residential appraisal, 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 would like a copy of the appraisal document, you normally have to get it through your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment's nature, attaining and maintaining an appropriate 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 Salt River Valley Appraisals.

Appraisers may often have fiduciary obligations to third parties, including homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are defined in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is only to those 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 keep their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Salt River Valley Appraisals makes a part of their standard routine.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Doing assignments on contingency fees is not something we can consider That is, we don'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 industries biggest taboo, because it would tend to make appraisers increase the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We don't do that. 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 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," in addition to other situations We diligently follow these rules to the letter which means you can be confident we are working hard to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

With Salt River Valley Appraisals, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, professional service.