For honest and ethical appraisals, rely on Alliance Appraisal Network

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 certainly be dubbed a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

For an appraiser the chief obligation is to his or her client. Typically, in residential practice, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including confidentiality for their clients a homeowner, if you want to review the appraisal document, you normally have to get it from your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, reaching and sustaining a respectable level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Here at Alliance Appraisal Network, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers will sometimes be required to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, buyers and sellers, or others. Generally the third parties are clearly 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 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 at least five years - at Alliance Appraisal Network you can rest assured that we abide by that rule.

Alliance Appraisal Network holds itself to the industry standards and guidelines set in place for ethics. We refuse to accept anything less from ourselves. We never do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we can't agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal industries most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers raise the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unethical practices may be established by state law or professional organizations to which an appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also defines a violation in ethics 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 confident we are doing everything we can to objectively determine the home or property value.

With Alliance Appraisal Network, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, professional service.