Our mission is to empower homeowners and commercial businesses to correct property tax over-assessments as well as help family, friends and clients reduce over-assessments. See our FREE resource. Find good comparable homes that sold in your area. Next you need to meet with the tax assessor. You’ll need to find out what home the tax assessor has used for his estimate of your home’s value. This is n
ecessary in order to counter his argument for imposing his valuation by point out areas that are not similar and introducing more similar comparables that you have chosen and hope for a meeting of the minds. If the tax assessor is uncooperative, you can fax a request to the appraisal district for this information. The Freedom of Information Act insures that you can be provided with this information. You will be challenged by the information that the town will be using against you, so you need to know what comparables they have chosen. Take photographs to back up your property value contentions. As the adage says, a photo is worth a thousand words, use them to your advantage. Offer examples you found that are more similar. Adjust for dollar differences for location, square footage, quality, age and condition, etc. of the home to nail down an exact value. Hunt for those comparables that sold and are in your own neighborhood. Location is the most important valuation feature since different neighborhoods have different price points. Focus on other similar features such as number of bedrooms, baths, quality and style of home, number of garages and make adjustments accordingly. The tax assessor will likely cherry pick the more expensive homes and they may have dissimilar features that you’ll need to address in your analysis. Adjust for any difference in square footage, number of garages, etc. Make additions or subtractions to each of the comparables you have chosen for differences. When you’re comfortable with the value conclusion you have reached, approach your tax assessor and present your case. The tax assessor not deviate from his value conclusion since they have a built in bias to stick to their figures. They are there to raise money for the town government to spend. You then have to take your case to the next level of appeal. By winning a property tax appeal, you’ll not only save on this years taxes, but that same reduced assessment will carry on until the next blanket reassessment. A future blanket reassessment of your community may be not forthcoming for another 10 or more years. Unjust property tax valuations need to be appealed.