ABS Appraisals Services maintains the highest professional ethics

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 certainly be dubbed a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we have a strict ethical code.

For an appraiser the primary responsibility is to his or her client. Normally, in residential practice, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have certain duties of privacy to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you would like a copy of the appraisal document, you should obtain it through your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate calculations appropriate to the scope of the report, reaching and sustaining a certain level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Here at ABS Appraisals Services, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

Appraisers can also have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Those third parties normally are spelled out in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is restricted to those parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the job.

There are also ethical duties that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must keep their work files for at least five years - at ABS Appraisals Services you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

We demand the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. Doing orders on contingency fees is not something we can consider That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. Another practice that's restricted is doing assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal professions biggest no-no, because it would tend to make appraisers increase the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unprofessional practices may be established by state law or professional societies to which an appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also states 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 be confident we are working hard to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

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