For honest and ethical appraisals, rely on JS Wickliffe & Company

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have increased more than ever in the past. So it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. As with any profession we are bound by an ethical code.

We have many responsibilities as appraisers but first and foremost we answer to our clients. Typically, for a standard residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including keeping many matters private for their clients a homeowner, if you require to review an appraisal report, you should get it from your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate figures appropriate to the nature of the assignment, reaching and maintaining a certain level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics is just normal course of business for us at JS Wickliffe & Company.

Appraisers may also have fiduciary obligations to third parties, such as homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Those third parties normally are defined in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is only to those third parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the order.

Appraisers also have standards outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must store their work files for a minimum of five years - at JS Wickliffe & Company you can rest assured that we adhere to that rule.

We meet or beat the industry standards and rules set in place for ethics. We refuse to accept anything less from ourselves. Working on orders that contingency fees is never an option. That is, we don't 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 perhaps the appraisal industries biggest taboo, because it would tend to make appraisers raise the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unprofessional 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 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 confident we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

As soon as you engage JS Wickliffe & Company we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the an ethical approach with appraisals that we're known for.