Note from The Tim: The following is a guest post from Charlie Walsh, the Founder and CEO of ValueAppeal, a new startup based in Seattle. ValueAppeal is a simple online tool that homeowners can use to help them appeal their property tax assessments.
King County Property Tax Appeal Deadline Is Soon!
Each year counties around the country send out notices in the mail letting homeowners know what the new assessed value of their home is for property tax purposes. Unlike most counties around the country, King County doesn’t send out all of their assessment notices at the same time. Over the course of the summer, the King County Assessor sends out assessment notices for a different neighborhood each week. Homeowners have sixty (60) days from the postmark date on their mailing notice to file their appeal (a.k.a. Real Property Petition Form) with the King County Board of Equalization. That means each neighborhood’s appeal deadline is a little different.
When homeowners receive their notice in the mail that their property tax assessment has gone up above the market value of the home, the gut reaction is “there’s no way I could sell my house for that much.” That’s exactly what happened recently to the Thompson family in Seattle. They received a notice in the mail that their four bedroom, 3 bathroom home was assessed for over $675,000, way more than they could possibly sell it for on the open market.
Unfortunately, most homeowners leave it at that. They pay their bill grudgingly and try to forget about it. A lot of homeowners may not even realize how much they’re overpaying because their mortgage company pays the property taxes on their behalf and then adds it to their statement each month. Fortunately the Thompsons didn’t just accept their unfair assessment, they figured out the rules for filing and appeal and lowered their assessment by just over $110,000, saving them over $1,300 on their property tax bill.
The first thing the Thompson’s did correctly was to make sure they filed their Real Property Petition Form before the end of their 60 day appeal window. (The Real Property Petition Form is available on the King County Assessor’s website, or by calling 206-296-7300) All King County homeowners receive an assessment notice in the mail between April and September of each year. The mailings are intentionally staggered over the course of the summer and homeowners have 60 days from the date of their mailing notice to file a notice of intent to appeal their assessment. The Thompsons received their assessment notice in the mail on September 10th so they had to file their appeal by November 9th at the latest.
In their research, the Thompsons learned that in order to prove their case for a lower assessment to the Board of Equalization, they needed to present 3-5 comparables homes “comps” along with the Real Property Petition Form they downloaded from the assessor’s website. This meant finding nearby homes similar in square feet, lot size, bedrooms, bathrooms, etc, that sold for less than their home was assessed for. This was the Thompson’s first big hurdle; where were they going to get the comps?
Finding the correct comps is harder than you might think.
Many homeowners will start by typing their address into a service like Zillow to get a long list of about 40 comps and picking the ones that seem best at first glance. Unfortunately, this often leads to their comps being disqualified and their appeal case being unceremoniously thrown out.
Why? There are a number of reasons comps are disqualified during an appeal hearing. For starters, the King County Assessor evaluates your home’s value as of the January 1st assessment date each year by looking at comps that sold PRIOR to that assessment date. Therefore, in order to successfully appeal, the homeowner must also submit comps that sold PRIOR to the assessment date as well. Zillow’s data is constantly updated to attempt to determine a real time market value, so most of the comps you see displayed for your property sold AFTER January 1st, 2009 and would be disqualified by the assessor.
And that’s not all. Homeowners are not allowed to submit comps that sold as part of a foreclosure, short sale, inheritance or divorce transaction, donation to charity, or any other non arm’s length transaction. Yet all of these transactions are technically “sales” and show up in official records. Unfortunately if you look up comps on Zillow, many of these important details get lost.
As you can see there are some hurdles that homeowners have to deal with when appealing their property taxes. Finding the correct comps to use in a property tax appeal is difficult. Fortunately for the Thompsons, today there are online property tax appeal resources available to help homeowners select the correct comps that didn’t even exist as recently as 2008.
On August 27th, 2009 the King County Assessor mailed assessment notices for the following neighborhoods: Queen Anne, Western West Seattle, Rainier Beach, Broadview, Blue Ridge, and Shilshole. That means the sixty (60) day window for these neighborhoods closes on Monday October 26th, 2009. If you’re only a week or two late filing your Real Property Petition Form they’ll usually let it slide, but don’t push it. If you never received your assessment notice in the mail you can sign an affidavit saying you never received it and they’ll allow you to file your petition after the deadline.
Click below for the remaining upcoming appeal King County property tax appeal deadlines.
| Neighborhood | Mailing Date | Appeal Deadline |
|---|---|---|
| Laurelhurst / Windermere | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Mercer Island | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Enumclaw Plateau | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Ravenna / University District | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Blk Diamond / E Maple Valley | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| East Auburn / SE Kent | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Kennydale / Newport Shores | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Kingsgate & Queensgate | 9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| Fall City/Preston / Issaquah Highlands / Snoqualmie Ridge |
9/3/09 | 11/2/09 |
| West Kent | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
| Issaquah to May Valley | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
| Covington | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
| Lake Youngs | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
| Kent & Renton Suburbs | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
| Vashon Island | 9/17/09 | 11/16/09 |
softwarengineer » Oct 29, 2009 at 12:10 pm
My SE King County Property Assessment Went Down 12.3%
Its unofficial, but verbally others in SE King County tell me their’s went up.
If what I’m hearing is true, the King County property assessment process is in a a total quagmire.
But another thought to brighten your day…..LOL….let’s say your assessment went down like mine, but what if they increase your property tax next year anyway?
Joe Van Dyk » Oct 29, 2009 at 12:49 pm
If I just bought a house for a ‘normal’ price (i.e. not a short sale) two months ago, the property tax valuation should be approximately what I bought if for, right?
Kary L. Krismer » Oct 29, 2009 at 1:00 pm
RE: softwarengineer @ 1 – Well, as I’m sure you know, if the average reduction in assessment was more than yours, changes are your taxes will go up. The tax paid is relative to all the other properties.
Charlie Walsh » Oct 29, 2009 at 2:05 pm
On average property tax assessments went down by about 15% in King County this year, but it can vary widely by neighborhood. Indeed, plenty of homeowners saw their assessments increase.
If your home isnt overassessed there isnt much you can do about your property tax bill. However, if the nominal tax rate is raised for everyone, the people that will lose the most are the ones who should have appealed… but didn’t.
Charlie Walsh » Oct 29, 2009 at 2:12 pm
Joe-
Unfortunately not. King County properties are assessed once per year as of January 1st. Therefore, the price you paid for the home in July or August this year is not relevant to your January 1st, 2009 assessment because the sale happened after the assessment date.
This doesnt mean you aren’t overassessed though. The best way to find out if you’re overassessed or not is to type your address into the ValueAppeal homepage and we’ll tell you instantly for free.
Kary L. Krismer » Oct 29, 2009 at 4:23 pm
We closed in October, and they still assessed our property high the next year. I contemplated appealing to get the experience, but didn’t. If I’d known of Valueappeal at the time (assuming it existed then), that might have gotten me off my butt.
David McManus » Oct 29, 2009 at 4:35 pm
My assessment went up 100K last year and went down 100K this year. In prior years, the assessment would actually stay about the same from year to year. This is on a house I bought for 300K in 2003. I have to agree with SoftwareEngineer in that the King County Assessor’s office seems to be in a total quagmire.
David Losh » Oct 29, 2009 at 11:19 pm
Appealing your tax assessment is kind of a lost art. For many new home owners this will be new information. It’s true that some people feel that lowering your assessment may lower a buyer’s perception of value. In the past that may have been true.
With declining property prices more and more people are going to want to lower expenses or lower perceived value. Governments are going to be looking for money. Tax assessment is a quick and easy way to raise revenue.
When I first saw this site I originally thought it is a great concept in a declining market. You could use it to prepare low ball offers on properties. It’s refreshing that in a time when every one wants to prop up prices this site is looking to lower them.
R » Oct 30, 2009 at 12:12 am
Charlie, I think there are a couple date calculation errors in your post.
If the Thompsons received their notice on Sept 10, then filing the petition on Nov 10 would not be timely. The assessment notice would have been mailed no later than Sept 9 and there are 31 days in Oct. This means the 60 days would expire on Nov 8, which is a Sunday. So, will the petition be timely if filed on Monday, Nov 9th?
Also, what constitutes filing? Does my petition have to be postmarked by the deadline or received by the deadline?
Finally, it appears you miscounted again at the end of the post, right before your table of dates. If the assessment notices are mailed out on Sept 3rd, 60 days expires on Nov 2nd. Why do you state that the deadline is Oct 26th?
Kary L. Krismer » Oct 30, 2009 at 7:33 am
By David Losh @ 8:
I’m not sure that’s ever been true, but FWIW, I wrote a piece on that topic over at Valueappeal.
http://blog.valueappeal.com/zestimate/could-lowered-assessed-value-hurt-you-when-you-sell-your-home
My conclusion was it was most likely to have no effect at all, that it was slightly possible it would increase the amount someone was willing to pay (because of lower tax payments), and somewhat less likely than that to decrease what they’re willing to pay.
David Losh » Oct 30, 2009 at 8:15 am
RE: Kary L. Krismer @ 9 –
That part of the comment was in response to your post on the ValueAppeal site.
It may have been an issue when people could just sell a property and move on, but today most, and I mean most, people are just stuck with a property declining in value.
Your assessment won’t be going down below market pricing because the numbers are based on market sales. The comparables are coming in lower and lower. The County will most likely try to keep your assessment up as high as possible, but it’s ridiculous for you to pay more in taxes than what your property is actually worth.
I’m finding it hard to understand why people in the Real Estate business can not admit property values are declining and will be, now, for years to come.
Kary L. Krismer » Oct 30, 2009 at 8:38 am
By David Losh @ 11:
The county has no incentive to keep “your assessment up as high as possible . . ..” You should know that.
I don’t as to the second part, I don’t think anyone is denying that property values have declined, but any projection of years and years to come is worthless.
truthtold » Oct 30, 2009 at 11:05 am
Municipality has interest in keeping “assessment up high” and despite nice anecdotes, appealing the county shmeckspert is typically a graceless waste of time. The only ‘chin’ in shmeckspert role is for increased valuation + revenue. Greater fool (a.k.a. comparable recent sales) property values create high comps and increased tax revenues – that’s why they are utilized and have been considered fair + lovely. Assessor is typically defensive and somewhat punchy regarding technique and skill of their keen-math valuation.
Now things are different and comps are unfavorable as greater fools are reduced in number and cities are fiscally challenged or broke while wrestling the likes of T. Eiman…I wonder if municipalities will abandon greater fool valuation in favor of stability which could also be read as integrity. In any case – we’re absolutely broke and I suspect current tax levels will be remembered fondly.
Charlie Walsh » Oct 30, 2009 at 11:51 am
Thanks for double checking the appeal deadlines in the post. I’ll take a look too verify.
As to your question about what constitutes a filing. The King County Assessor’s website says this:
“If submitted by mail, petitions must be postmarked by the post office no later than the filing deadline”
In reality they aren’t that hard core about it. Usually if you aren’t more than a week or two late in filing your appeal they’ll accept it anyway. If you’re a month or more late then you’re out of luck. If you never received your assessment notice in the mail you can sign an affidavit saying you never received it and they’ll allow you to file your petition far after the deadline. You have to call them to get the affidavit.
Kary L. Krismer » Oct 30, 2009 at 12:31 pm
RE: Charlie Walsh @ 14 – That’s interesting. I’ve had them catch a tax payment check that was mailed a day late. I wouldn’t think it would be worth paying someone to check postmarks until at least 3 days after the deadline. The interest simply isn’t that much.