What This Statute Says
Real estate appraisers face liability when their professional work is alleged to be wrong. This section sets a combined limit: the earlier of the ordinary limitation period for the type of claim and a fixed cap measured from the appraisal report date.
A. A person who has a cause of action for damages against a real estate appraiser for malpractice, negligence, an error, a mistake, an omission or a breach in connection with a real estate appraisal or an appraisal-related service, whether based in contract or tort, shall commence the action before the earlier of:
A.R.S. § 12-531When This Statute Comes Into Play
The rule applies when:
- An estate or trust suffers loss because an appraisal of inherited property was materially wrong.
- A beneficiary discovers that a property was valued incorrectly during prior administration.
- A lender or buyer pursues the appraiser years after a transaction where the appraisal proved unreliable.
What This Means for Arizona Families
Appraisals support estate tax filings, equitable distributions, and property sales. When the appraisal is wrong, the consequences can be enormous, but the window to act is finite. This section spells out the deadline.
If you discovered after the fact that an estate or trust suffered because of a flawed appraisal, look at both the date the cause of action accrued and the report date itself. The earlier deadline controls. Our FAQ on managing real estate during probate or trust administration covers the role of appraisals in fiduciary work. An Arizona probate or real estate attorney can analyze whether the claim is still alive and whether the appraiser's professional liability insurance is a realistic source of recovery. Many estate disputes involving real property eventually circle back to whether an early appraisal was right. A fiduciary duty claim against the personal representative often runs in parallel, and coordinating both tracks helps the family pursue the deepest pocket and the cleanest theory of recovery.