Option One Appraisal Services provides honest and ethical appraisals for Orange County

Honesty and Integrity: Option One Appraisal Services

We consider what we do as a profession. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. So it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can certainly be dubbed a profession rather than a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

An appraiser's main responsibility is to their client. Most of the time, for a regular residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal, and often the appraisal is ordered by a third party the lender has retained to maintain independence. Appraisers are typically restricted to only disclosing information to their clients, so as a homeowner, if you would like a copy of the appraisal document, you normally have to obtain it via your lender instead of the appraiser.

Other responsibilities include numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, acquiring and maintaining a respectable level of competency and education, and naturally, the appraiser must bear a professional demeanor. Here at Option One Appraisal Services, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers will sometimes need to consider the interests of third parties, including homeowners, both buyers and sellers, or others. Those third parties normally are defined in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is restricted to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the job.


	Option One Appraisal Services has worked hard for its track record for performing competent and ethically superior appraisals. Contact us today to learn more.

There are also ethical rules that have nothing to do with clients and others. For example, appraisers must be able to produce their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Option One Appraisal Services makes a part of their standard routine.

When creating reports, we follow the highest ethical standards possible. Accepting assignments based on contingency fees is never an option. In other words, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and base our pay upon coming up with a particular value conclusion. Anyone should be able to see that fabricating a home's value to achieve a bigger fee is unethical!

Finally, the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice explicitly 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", or "the amount of a value opinion" in addition to other situations We follow these rules to the letter which means you can be assured we are doing everything we can to get you an accurate home or property value.

When you engage Option One Appraisal Services, we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you deserve along with the honesty and integrity we're known for.