Assessments are in for Charlottesville and for Albemarle, Rachana Dixit and Brandon Shulleeta report for the Daily Progress, and the trend is strongly downward.
For the first time since 1976, there’s been a decline in Charlottesville home values—a 2.19% drop—plus a 0.34% drop in commercial property values. That adds up to a $175k drop in city revenue, assuming a stable tax rate, which isn’t bad. Last year, home values went up 1% in the city, despite the national trend.
Albemarle home values dropped by 4%, while commercial properties dropped by 0.64%—basically the same ratio that the city saw. That’s not as bad as the county planned. With the current property tax rate at 74.2¢ per $100 of assessed value (that is, a 0.742% tax on property value), they’d have to take the rate up to 76.6¢ to keep revenue stable. Given the opposition to a tax increase among the Republican majority on the board—they support keeping the rate at the current rate—that’s going to mean a a 3.2% decrease in spending based on that income.
So the rate is only 0.00742%? That’s pretty good. If I had a $300,000 house, I’d only have to pay $22.26 at that rate — less than the cost of a restaurant week dinner.
*Laugh* You’re right, of course—I read the number right off the calculator and added a percentage sign, rather than moving the decimal point over a couple of places. :) I’ve corrected that now with a more realistic (and, I hope, accurate) number.
The city and county assessments are still well above the actual value of the homes.
The little decrease in assessments is suppose to make us fell good, as opposed to still feeling like we’re being slapped around like ignorant and spineless lemmings.
I wonder how many people understand what methods the city and county assessors use to come up with the assessed value of an individual property. Just a question. I’m not going to try to explain it myself.
Well, I’d love for someone to explain in detail how it’s done, or link to somewhere that does. Back in the market frenzy it seemed they just assessed a little below whatever the last purchase price was, at least for my house, and then a house that had not sold in 20 years would have a very low assessment in comparison.
Cville eye the method I always thought the assessors used to determine the value of a piece of property was simple enough: How many feathers (tax $’s) can we pluck from the goose and gander before they start to squak? I’m sure it is a little more complicated than that but that is one way of looking at how assessments are determined.
Oh, by the way, I got my assessment in the mail today and it has gone down by 10K . Surprised me considering I’ve always thought my assessment was too high.
Mine went up $1700, despite the homes that were on the market last year in my neighborhood that sold for much less than the assessed value or didn’t sell at atll after many months on the market.
Mine (City) stayed the same: despite the fact that an identical house directly across the street from me is and has been on the market for $40K less….
My land stayed the same (the structure is still under construction), although I think the assessment is fair, so I’ve got no quarrel. oniss, Cville Eye, it looks like jogger was the beneficiary of y’all’s assessments. :)
So when does this “assessments value decline” translate into real estate property value savings for real “real estate” property owners.?
yes, Waldo, I’ve noticed these in the past two years, the “neighborhoods” that go up one year will go flat or decline the next while a flat one will go up or down the next year or the lowered one will go up that year. It’s just a matter of years. The city’s income from the tax stays pretty much the same. It helps O’Connell to write a budget beofre the actual assessments are determined. He’s projecting in November and the assessments go out two months later.
@TrvlnMn the savings are realized only when you pay your taxes.
Holy wow – mine went down almost 11%.
Mine stayed the same for the second year in a row, but a few years ago our assessments were going up 40% a year, which was ridiculous, I thought.
Were there many houses on the market last year in your neighborhood. There seemed to be fewer than usual in mine.
Patience: Same thing happening here. Had a 31% (!!) year-on-year increase in 2006, another 13% in 2007, then flat 2008, 2009, and 2010.
(It was actually down a trivial $500 this year, but that’s because I reported the demolition of an ancient metal car shelter–courtesy of Hurricane Isabel–which they removed from my record.)