Honesty and Integrity: Preston-Amherst

Appraising is, by and large, a long term career. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can definitely be called a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

We have quite a few responsibilities as appraisers but our main duty is to our clients. Most of the time, for a standard residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have certain duties of confidentiality to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you desire to review an appraisal report, you should get it from your lender. Other obligations also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment parameters, reaching and maintaining an appropriate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Preston-Amherst, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

There are some scenarios in which appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Generally the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is only to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, 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 clients and others. For example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for a minimum of five years - at Preston-Amherst you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. We never do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we are not able to 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 taboo, because it would invite fraudulent practices since increasing the estimate of the home would increase the their paycheck. We don't do that. Other unprofessional 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 unethical behavior 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 follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are doing everything we can to objectively determine the home or property value.

With Preston-Amherst, you won't have any doubts that you're receiving 100 percent ethical, honest service.