![]() Larry Bridges upholds the highest professional ethicsAppraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever before. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can definitely be considered a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we have a strict ethical code.
The appraiser's main responsibility is to their client.
More often than not, for a normal residential appraisal, the lender (or an agent of the lender) places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client.
It follows that appraisers are typically limited to only disclosing their findings to their clients, so as
a homeowner, if you want to review the appraisal document, you generally have to obtain it through your lender.
Appraisers can frequently have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Generally the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is restricted to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the job.
There are also ethical rules that have nothing to do with clients and others. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - something else Larry Bridges makes a part of their standard routine. We meet or exceed the industry standards and guidelines set in place for professional behavior. We can't accept anything less from ourselves. Doing orders based on contingency fees is not something we can consider. That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. It should be apparent to anyone that fabricating a property's value to achieve a higher fee is unethical! We just don't do it. Finally, the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice 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", or "the amount of a value opinion" in addition to other situations We diligently 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 Larry Bridges, you won't have any doubts that you're getting 100 percent ethical, honest service. |