Fortiz Appraisal Services upholds the highest professional ethics

We have a lot of responsibilities as appraisers, but our main duty is to our clients. Typically, in residential practice, 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 require to obtain a copy of the appraisal document, you should request it through your lender. Other obligations also include accurate figures appropriate to the nature of the report, acquiring and maintaining an adequate level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Fortiz Appraisal Services, we take these ethical responsibilities very to heart.

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Appraisers will regularly need to consider the interests of third parties, such as homeowners, buyers and sellers, or others. Third parties normally are spelled out in the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is limited to those parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.

Appraisers also have duties outside of boundaries of with whom we share information for example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Fortiz Appraisal Services diligently adheres to.

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We require the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. We have a responsibility not to 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. We can't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal profession’s most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers inflate the value of homes or properties to increase their fee. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other unprofessional practices may be defined by state law or professional societies that the appraiser belongs to.

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The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also defines unethical behavior 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," as well as other situations. We follow these rules to the letter which means you can rest easy knowing we are doing everything we can to objectively determine the home or property value.

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As soon as you engage Fortiz Appraisal Services, we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you expect along with the ethical handling of appraisals that we're known for.