Joe Chuchran maintains the utmost professional ethics

Typically, appraising a long term career. 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 rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by ethical considerations.

We have a great deal of obligations as appraisers but our main duty is to our clients. Typically, for a regular 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 would like a copy of an appraisal report, you normally have to request it from your lender. Other responsibilities also include, numerical accuracy depending on the assignment parameters, reaching and maintaining a particular 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 Joe Chuchran.

There are some scenarios in which appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, including homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are defined in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is only to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the assignment.

Appraisers also have duties outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for at least five years - something else Joe Chuchran makes a part of their standard routine.

We demand the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. Working on orders that 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. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal industries most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers raise the value of homes or properties to increase their fee. We don't do that. 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 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 diligently follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are going above and beyond to objectively determine the home or property value.

With Joe Chuchran, you won't have any doubts that you're receiving 100 percent ethical, honest service.