Honesty and Integrity: dba Zebo Zebe Appraisals

We consider our what we do a profession. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can certainly be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

For an appraiser the primary obligation is to their client. More often than not, 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 a copy of the appraisal document, you normally have to get it through your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, attaining and maintaining a respectable level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at dba Zebo Zebe Appraisals, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

In some cases appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, buyers and sellers, or others. Typically the third parties are specifically 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 things in the framework of the job.

There are also ethical duties that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for a minimum of five years - at dba Zebo Zebe Appraisals you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Working on assignments that contingency fees is not something we can consider That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and collect the fee only if the loan closes. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers up the value of homes or properties to increase their fee. 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 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," as well as other situations. We follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are doing everything we can to objectively determine the home or property value.

With dba Zebo Zebe Appraisals, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, honest service.