Columbus Appraisal Company, LLC maintains the highest professional ethics

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. So it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can certainly be considered a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

We have a great deal of obligations as appraisers but our primary duty is to our clients. Most of the time, in residential practice, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have certain duties of confidentiality to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you would like to review the appraisal document, you should obtain it from your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate calculations appropriate to the nature of the report, reaching and sustaining an appropriate level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Here at Columbus Appraisal Company, LLC, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers will often be required to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, both sellers and buyers, or others. Typically the third parties are explicitly defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is restricted to those parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the assignment.

Appraisers also have rules outside of boundaries of with whom we share information For example, appraisers must store their work files for at least five years - at Columbus Appraisal Company, LLC you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

We require the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. We have a responsibility not to do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries biggest taboo, because it would invite fraudulent practices since increasing the estimate of the home would inflate the 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 states unethical behavior 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 working hard to objectively determine the home or property value.

With Columbus Appraisal Company, LLC, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, honest service.