Honesty and Integrity: California First Appraisal

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 definitely be called a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

An appraiser's chief responsibility is to their client. Most of the time, 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 desire a copy of the appraisal document, you should obtain it through your lender. Other responsibilities also include, accurate calculations appropriate to the scope of the report, reaching and sustaining a particular 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 California First Appraisal.

Appraisers will frequently be obligated 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 responsibility is restricted to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the assignment.

There are also ethical standards that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - at California First Appraisal you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

We meet or beat the industry standards and mandates set in place for professional behavior. We refuse to accept anything less from ourselves. We never do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal industries most important rule, because it would invite fraudulent practices since raising the estimate of the home would increase the fee. We set ourselves to a higher standard. 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 states unethical behavior 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," as well as other situations. We diligently follow these rules to the letter which means you can be confident we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

With California First Appraisal, you won't have any doubts that you're getting 100 percent ethical, professional service.