Honesty and Integrity: My Trilla Appraisals

We think of what we do as a profession. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever before. So it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be called a profession rather than a trade. As with any profession we have a strict ethical code.

As appraisers our primary obligation is to his or her client. Most of the time, in residential practice, the lender places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers are privy to a lot of information, and like an attorney can only discuss many matters with their client. As a homeowner, if you desire to obtain a copy of the appraisal document, you should get it from your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, reaching and keeping a particular level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is is what we do everyday at My Trilla Appraisals.

Appraisers will regularly be obligated to consider the interests of 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 third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the assignment.

Appraisers also have duties outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - at My Trilla Appraisals you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

We demand the highest ethical standards possible from ourselves. Working on assignments that contingency fees is never an option. That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and collect the fee only if the loan closes. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal industries biggest taboo, because it would invite fraudulent practices since increasing the estimate of the home would raise the fee. We don't do that. Other unethical practices may be established by state law or professional societies that the 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 at ease knowing we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

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