Home values now below assessed values?
September 2, 2009
Obviously, you’ve heard of the real estate mess our country has/is facing? As a mortgage lender , I see it everyday. Obviously I have seen how lenders offering 100% financing with sometimes less than perfect credit probably wasn’t the most prudent thing in the world to do in years past.
While I try to stay positive and tell people “real estate is like politics; it’s all local”, there have been some serious impacts in certain price ranges in the past several months – right here in our community. More so in some price ranges than others.
Just tonight I had two appraisals in the same neighborhood come back WELL below the homeowner’s expected value. Yes, I know, everyone always thinks THEIR house is worth more than it probably is; however, these values are WELL BELOW the Richland County tax assessed value on record.
My question is…will the county start facing falling property taxes based on the possibility that these homes are no longer worth what the county assessed them to be ?
Tax assessed value: $549,900 Appraisal tonight: $475,000
Tax assessed value: $489,900 Appraisal tonight: $355,000
Comments
4 Responses to “Home values now below assessed values?”
Got something to say?
Nathan,
Unless you want to introduce legislation to require annual reassessments on property, this is just an inherent risk with a 5 year reassessment window. If the owner doesn’t follow the state mandated appeal process, they are just out of luck.
Nathan,
A couple of years ago, the voters passed a sales tax increase in Richland county so the tax office could lower our tax rate. Indeed the taxes on my home went down a little over 20%.
Since that time, the voters passed a bond referendum for District Five that will likely cause a slight increase in our taxes. We take that responsibility on ourselves.
The unbelieveable event that took place was the recent revaluation of our home, that increased our tax appraisal by $20,000. I fully expect our tax bill this year to be greater than any we have ever received in the past and we still have to pay the increased sales tax. For that increase we have seen continued use of portable classrooms, significantly greater congestion due to unrestrained development between Irmo and Ballentine and to make matters worse, salary decreases of about !0% to offset the effects of the recession on my employer.
I’m thoroughly convinced that our county government is at best incompetent and more believably, totally dishonest. I see the same tendency from our state government and to be sure, our federal government. When will the deception and the dishonesty go away? Must we wait for the Second Coming for relief?
With you and Lindsay Graham as the sole exceptions, I propose the voters impose strict term limitations…..re-elect nobody.
Steve and Dave, some folks in County Government must read my blog ; ) I received a phone call last week about my post.
In this environment (declining values due to low comparable sales and limited comparable sales), I would think the county would have a hard time INCREASING the assessments. I would be pleasantly SURPRISED if they lowered the values but, at a minimum, we should see that value stay flat on our new bills. We’ll see…
Thanks for posting!
Nathan
How do you like that point of sale assessment now, counties? The SC Assoc. of Counties fought last session to keep POS…my guess is they’ll change their tune this year with falling values.