Honesty and Integrity: TSH Real Estate and Appraisal Services, LLC

Appraising is a profession, and appraisers are professionals. Requirements to become a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. That's why it goes without question these days that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be called a profession as opposed to a trade. In our field, as with any profession, we must follow strict ethical considerations.

We have many responsibilities as appraisers but our chief duty is to our clients. More often than not, for a typical residential appraisal, the appraiser's client is the lender ordering the appraisal. Appraisers are required to only disclosing information to their clients, and as a homeowner, if you desire to review the appraisal document, you should get it through your lender. Other obligations also include, accurate sums appropriate to the scope of the report, acquiring and sustaining a respectable level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is standard operating procedure for us at TSH Real Estate and Appraisal Services, LLC.

In some cases appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, sellers and buyers, or others. Those third parties normally are spelled out in scope of the appraisal assignment itself. An appraiser's fiduciary responsibility is only to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.

Appraisers also have standards outside of boundaries of clients and others. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for a minimum of five years - at TSH Real Estate and Appraisal Services, LLC you can rest assured that we abide by that rule.

TSH Real Estate and Appraisal Services, LLC holds itself to the industry standards and guidelines set in place for professional behavior. We won't accept anything less from ourselves. We don't 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 don't do assignments on percentage fees. That is probably the appraisal professions most important rule, because it would tend to make appraisers inflate the value of homes or properties to increase their paycheck. We don't do that. Other improper practices may be defined by state law or professional organizations that the appraiser belongs.

The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP) also states unethical behavior 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 going above and beyond to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

When you engage TSH Real Estate and Appraisal Services, LLC 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.