Honesty and Integrity: Associate Appraisers of America

An appraiser's chief obligation is to their client. Most of the time, for a standard residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal, and often the appraisal is ordered by a third party the lender has hired in order to maintain independence. Subsequently, 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 normally have to obtain it from your lender and not the appraiser.

Other responsibilities include accurate sums appropriate to the parameters of the report, reaching and maintaining an adequate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Associate Appraisers of America, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

Appraisers will frequently need to consider the interests of third parties, such as homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Typically the third parties are clearly defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is limited to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the assignment.

	Associate Appraisers of America has worked hard for its track record for completing competent and ethically superior appraisals. To learn more, contact us.

There are also ethical duties that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must store their work files for at least five years - something else Associate Appraisers of America takes very seriously.

When busy with an order, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Accepting assignments where our fee is dependent on our value conclusion is not something we can consider. In other words, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. There's a definite conflict of interest if an appraiser can report a larger value with the reward of getting paid more money! We just don't do it.

Finally, the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (or simply "USPAP") clearly 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" as well as other situations. We follow these rules to the letter which means you can be confident we are going above and beyond to get you an accurate home or property value.

As soon as you engage Associate Appraisers of America, we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you deserve along with the high ethical standards we're known for.