Tax assessors boggled by housing dip

[Lloyd Bonafide]

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/atlanta/stories/2008/05/11/assess_0512.html

The training and rules for mass appraisal say taxable values should be set at fair market value or at the price for a sale between a "willing buyer and willing seller." Distressed sales, foreclosures and short sales are not supposed to count toward setting taxable values.

??? I think the Assessor needs some new rules.

Calvin Wimberly, a real estate agent who primarily sells bank-owned properties and has two listings under $10,000, said home prices in some areas have tumbled 200 or 300 percent in the past year. He said many suffered from mortgage fraud that artificially inflated values.

When prices drop by more than 100%, that's a pretty bad market.

Wimberly said he'd recently sold a home in West End that tells the tale of what's happened in some neighborhoods. The home sold in March 2004 for $305,000 and then in August 2004 for $700,000. It tumbled to $122,900 in a sale last year. It sold recently for $51,000.

Could the $700,000 sale have been fraudulent? :icon_mrgreen:

 

[Randolph Kinney]

We have Prop 13 and Prop 8.

Under Prop 13, the property tax is fixed to start at 1.25% of the purchase price. REO and short sale properties get this tax rate. It would be illogical to claim that distressed sales should be taxed higher than the selling price and what is allowed under Prop 13.

Prop 8 is what it is. There is no disqualification of a distressed sale for the basis of an appeal so even if you bought an REO property and the values went below your purchase price, you qualify for a property tax reduction.

 

[Terrel L. Shields]

The assessors will either cry foul and try to get the law changed or they will hunker down and NOT revalue the properties. Assessment remains a joke.

 

[Brad Ellis]

Lloyd,

When prices drop by more than 100%, that's a pretty bad market.

Looks pretty funny to me too! Not sure how any asset can decline by more than 100%.

Hey, maybe they want to pay us to take over some of these? You game?

I do not think I'd want to use old Calvin for my REO listigs.

Brad