Branam's Inc.- Real Estate maintains the utmost professional ethics

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever before. That's why it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can certainly be dubbed a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we are bound by an ethical code.

We have a lot of obligations as appraisers but above everything we answer to our clients. Normally, for a standard residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers have rules and regulations they must follow, including confidentiality for their clients a homeowner, if you desire to obtain a copy of an appraisal report, you should get it from your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate figures appropriate to the parameters of the assignment, attaining and keeping a certain level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Maintaining high ethics is standard operating procedure for us at Branam's Inc.- Real Estate.

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 roll is limited to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the assignment.

Appraisers also have rules outside of boundaries of with whom we share information For example, appraisers must store their work files for a minimum of five years - something else Branam's Inc.- Real Estate takes very seriously.

We demand the highest professional integrity possible from ourselves. We never do assignments on contingency fees. That is, we are not able to agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. We don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is perhaps the appraisal industries biggest no-no, because it would invite appraisal fraud since raising the estimate of the home would increase the their paycheck. We set ourselves to a higher standard. Other improper practices may be established by state law or professional organizations 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 follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are working hard to objectively determine the home or property value.

With Branam's Inc.- Real Estate, you won't have any doubts that you're receiving 100 percent ethical, professional service.