Beresford Appraisals provides honest and ethical appraisals for Charleston County

Beresford Appraisals upholds the highest professional ethics

Typically, appraising is a long term career. 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 certainly be considered a profession as opposed to a trade. As with any profession we are bound by ethical considerations.

An appraiser's main obligation is to their client. Typically, for a normal 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 hired in order to maintain independence. Subsequently, appraisers have certain duties of confidentiality to their clients, plus many rules and regulations that must be followed. So, as a homeowner, if you desire a copy of an appraisal report, you normally have to get it from your lender and not the appraiser.

Other obligations include numerical accuracy depending on the scope of the assignment, reaching and keeping an appropriate level of competency and education, and of course, the appraiser must behave in a professional manner. Maintaining high ethics and client confidentiality is what we do every day at Beresford Appraisals.

In some cases appraisers will have fiduciary responsibilities to third parties, such as homeowners, both sellers and buyers, or others. Typically the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary duty is limited to those parties who the appraiser is aware of, based on the scope of work or other things in the framework of the order.


	Beresford Appraisals has an established reputation for providing appraisals with the highest of ethics. To learn more, contact us.

There are also ethical duties that have nothing to do with clients and others. For example, appraisers must backup their work files for at least five years - something else Beresford Appraisals makes a part of their standard routine.

We meet or exceed the industry standards and guidelines set in place for professional behavior. We refuse to accept anything less from ourselves. Accepting assignments where our fee is dependent on our value conclusion is not something we can consider. That means we can't agree to do an appraisal report and get paid only if the loan closes. There's an obvious conflict of interest if an appraiser can report an unsubstantiated value with the reward of getting paid more money!

Finally, the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (or simply "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", or "the amount of a value opinion" in addition to other situations We diligently 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.

As soon as you engage Beresford Appraisals, we'll make sure you're getting the professional service you deserve along with the honesty and integrity we're known for.