Honesty and Integrity: RJW Appraisal Group, LLC

We consider our what we do a profession. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever before. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be dubbed a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

We have a great deal of responsibilities as appraisers but first and foremost we answer to our clients. Most of the time, for a standard residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers are privy to a lot of data, and like an attorney can only discuss many matters with their client. As a homeowner, if you desire 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, attaining and sustaining an adequate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics is just normal course of business for us at RJW Appraisal Group, LLC.

Appraisers can also have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Those third parties normally are spelled out in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is only to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the job.

Appraisers also have standards outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must keep their work files for at least five years - at RJW Appraisal Group, LLC you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

RJW Appraisal Group, LLC holds itself to the industry standards and mandates set in place for ethics. We can't accept anything less from ourselves. Doing orders on contingency fees is never an option. 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 probably the appraisal professions biggest no-no, because it would tend to make appraisers increase 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 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 follow these rules to the letter which means you can rest easy knowing we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

When you request an appraisal from RJW Appraisal Group, LLC we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the ethical handling of appraisals that we're known for.