Honesty and Integrity: KR Wentz Appraisals

Appraising is, by and large, a long term career. The rigors of becoming 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 dubbed a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we have a strict ethical code.

An appraiser's primary responsibility is to their client. Typically, for a standard residential appraisal, 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 want a copy of the appraisal document, you should request it from your lender. Other obligations also include, numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, reaching and sustaining an adequate level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Here at KR Wentz Appraisals, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers may also have fiduciary obligations to 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 limited to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.

There are also ethical rules that have nothing to do with whom we share information. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - at KR Wentz Appraisals you can rest assured that we stick to that rule.

We meet or beat the industry standards and guidelines set in place for ethics. We can't accept anything less from ourselves. We never 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. Another practice that's restricted is doing assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries biggest no-no, because it would invite fraudulent practices since increasing the value of the home would inflate the their paycheck. We don't do that. Other unethical practices may be defined by state law or professional societies to which an appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also defines unethical behavior 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 diligently 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 KR Wentz Appraisals, you won't have any doubts that you're getting 100 percent ethical, professional service.