Honesty and Integrity: Ticon Appraisal

By and large, appraising a long term career. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. That's why it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can definitely be considered a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

For an appraiser the chief responsibility is to his or her client. Typically, in residential practice, the lender places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers are required to only disclosing information to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you require to obtain a copy of an appraisal report, you normally have to get it from your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate sums appropriate to the nature of the assignment, attaining and maintaining an adequate level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics is is what we do everyday at Ticon Appraisal.

Appraisers will frequently be obligated to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, buyers and sellers, or others. Normally the third parties are explicitly defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is limited to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.

Appraisers also have duties outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for a minimum of five years - at Ticon Appraisal you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

We only perform to the highest ethical standards possible. We don't do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we are not able to 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 industries most important rule, because it would invite appraisal fraud since increasing the estimate of the home would inflate the their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other improper 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 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 diligently follow these rules to the letter which means you can be confident we are going above and beyond to objectively determine the home or property value.

As soon as you engage Ticon Appraisal we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the ethical handling of appraisals that we're known for.