Comments on Advance Indiana™: Marion County Re-Assessments A Vast Improvement

You should only celebrate if you do not own a busi...

2008-03-30T14:16:00.000-05:00

You should only celebrate if you do not own a business. My tax bill on my business, if I loose my appeal, will more than double. The previous assessment was right in line with a private appraisal I had for a refinance. If you rent from a business you should expect a large rent increase as most leases have a clause passing through tax increases.

I also disagree with your story. My assessment wen...

2008-03-30T09:18:00.000-05:00

I also disagree with your story. My assessment went up almost 27%. This will put me in the 1% cap that will not take full affect until 2010 or 2011. It depends on how one looks at the results. If based on the big bills or 2007, yes I would save money. But if you look at the 2006 bills plus the new 1% sells tax, in the end I and many others will be paying more in the end. Not to mention the goods you buy will have to cost more to cover that big raise in businesses property taxes. So in the end I do not see this as any property tax relief. Just the same thing that they have done for the last thirty five years and called it “property tax relief”.
DavidM http://indianapolsnewgoverment2008.blogspot.com/

I hope you'll take a look at things again in one y...

2008-03-30T08:34:00.000-05:00

I hope you'll take a look at things again in one year - after the businesses and apartment owners flood the various Assessor offices with appeals. I don't know if it was the decision of Greg Bowes or the Department of Local Government Finance, or even the contractors themselves -- but in someone's infinite wisdom, non-residential property was assessed using national sales figures, not local.

Imagine the overassessment that would occur if national home prices were applied to Indianapolis homes.

So, the proof will be in the pudding, but the pudding won't be done until the appeals are finalized. The more successful the appeals, the more tax will be collected next year to make up for this year's shortfall.

As for your man Mitch's wisdom in requiring a new assessment, he achieved his main goal -- lower the temperature of the public. I will be interested to see if the media follow up with how many people thought Mitch 'forgave' them the extra tax from 2007 and now face a few hundred or more in a reconcilliation bill. Oh, they generously granted us the right to pay over time, but pay we will.

That's a good question, Doug. Homeowners as a grou...

2008-03-29T20:40:00.000-05:00

That's a good question, Doug. Homeowners as a group are paying about 10 percentage points less of the burden according to the analysis in the Star even though overall homeowner assessments increased as a result of the do-over. I think that should translate into at least a 5%average reduction in addition to the amount taxpayers receive from last year's rebate and the additional savings from Daniels' property tax relief plan. I haven't seen what the median assessment amount is.

So, for the median homeowner, any idea what this m...

2008-03-29T20:25:00.000-05:00

So, for the median homeowner, any idea what this means in terms of dollars saved on a tax bill?

I was doing some research along those lines a couple of days ago, trying to figure out the median tax bill in dollars, and was having a remarkably difficult time. I saw lots of talk about percentage increases and whatnot, but not very much in terms of actual dollars for individual properties.