Isomorphism of Client Satisfaction and Client Sophistication in Client Influence on Valuations : A Systematic Content Analysis

While some pioneering works have reported the significant influence that clients have to sway the behavioural perspectives and value opinions of property valuers, others have examined the increasing trends of client sophistication in their demands on valuers and advised valuers to work towards client satisfaction. Several studies have also examined issues of client influence, client sophistication and client satisfaction in valuations but none of the available studies have endeavoured to establish the nexus between the concepts so as to report the very significant implications. Hence, this study determines the nexus between client satisfaction and client sophistication and how the two concepts amount to client influence in valuations. As a hybrid of systematic literature review and content analysis, this study undertook a critical exploration and a systematic appraisal of literature to fulfil the aim of the study. A database search for 20-year (2001-2021) extant studies was conducted using Google Scholar, Science Direct and Primo. The framework of Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) was adopted in the study and a mapping process based on content analysis was undertaken to establish the links among the concepts of study. Clients' demand for improved accuracy and consistency in valuations; clients' demand for transparency, rationality, and reliability in valuations; and the paucity of relevant market data as well as other market imperfections (among others) constitute issues of client satisfaction to valuers. However, the increasing emergence of more sophisticated, growth-explicit, and cross-disciplinary investment valuation (and statistical) models; the valuers' incapacity to adapt and adopt “difficult” computational models; as well as clients' subject expertise, experience, and information power (among others) reflect the level of client sophistication. Resulting from the above, valuers are surreptitiously subjected to client influence and compromise through client sophistication in their quest to obtain client satisfaction while undertaking valuations