Pinnacle Appraisals provides honest and ethical appraisals for Knox County

Honesty and Integrity: Pinnacle Appraisals

We think of our job as a profession. The rigors of becoming a licensed appraiser have become more difficult than ever in the past. That's why it goes without question in this day and age that real estate appraisal can unquestionably be called a profession rather than a trade. As with any profession we are bound by an ethical code.

The appraiser's primary responsibility is to their client. Typically, in residential practice, the lender (or an agent of the lender) places the order to the appraiser, becoming the appraiser's client. Appraisers are privy to a lot of information, and like an attorney, can only discuss many of these matters with their client. As a homeowner, if you want to review an appraisal report, you generally should request it from your lender and not the appraiser.

Other responsibilities include numerical accuracy depending on the assignment's nature, reaching and keeping a certain level of competency and education, and the appraiser must conduct him or herself as a professional. Here at Pinnacle Appraisals, we take these ethical responsibilities very seriously.

Appraisers can also have fiduciary obligations to third parties, such as homeowners, buyers and sellers, or others. Normally the third parties are specifically defined in the appraisal report. An appraiser's fiduciary roll is only to those third parties who the appraiser knows, based on the scope of work or other written parameters of the order.


	Pinnacle Appraisals has worked hard for its reputation for completing competent and ethically superior appraisals. To learn more, contact us.

There are also ethical duties 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 Pinnacle Appraisals diligently adheres to.

We demand the highest ethical standards possible from ourselves. Doing assignments where our fee is dependent on our value conclusion is never an option. That is, we don't agree to do an appraisal report and collect payment on the contingency of the loan closing. It should be obvious that fabricating a home's value to achieve essentially a higher paycheck is unethical! This isn't how we operate.

Finally, the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (or simply "USPAP") 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" as well as other situations. We diligently follow these rules to the letter which means you can be at ease knowing we are doing everything we can to provide an unbiased determination of the home or property value.

With Pinnacle Appraisals, you can be assured of 100 percent ethical, professional service.