For many properties, at least in the City, building values have increased only modestly, or even held steady or gone down, but land values have soared. The east suburban reassessed values that have been released also appear to be continuing the trend.

I have no explanation for why land values increased so much more than building values, other than that it’s what the computer modeling design has concluded. No one has pointed to any real-world financial or market factors to explain the change.

Some do feel that the new land value proportion and the new balance isn’t out of line, just … …just different from how values have been proportioned before.

We have been searching for a way to try to attack the land values that have gone up so much.

I’ve been discussing the idea of appealing just the land value, when all the increase has been allocated to the land amount.

If I tell you in an appeal that I accept the building value but that I’m appealing only the land part, and try to show that the land value is out of line, can they still maintain a high reassessment based on the total value and ignore evidence that their own allocation to the land value is wrong?

Folks in charge of reassessment have acknowledged that their focus is in fact on a property’s overall value, not on the separate allocated components.

For almost all of the County, the allocation between land and building value is an anachronism, a no-longer-relevant holdover from when land and buildings were taxed at separate rates. I was told that County assessment officials would have liked to get rid of the separate values breakdown this time around.

I expect that at all first-level formal appeals the focus will remain on aggregate, total value and that the land-only argument will fall on deaf ears and basically be ignored, even with unusually strong evidence that may on occasion be available.

After all, the appeal is not a “court of record,” where everyone’s statements and arguments are recorded in some way for later review if needed, and neither the hearing officer’s recommendation nor the Office of Property Assessment’s reasoning and decision are detailed in any written opinion.

All appeals to the next level are appeals de novo, that is, a complete “re-do” or “do-over,” with an all-new hearing and evidence, not a review of the prior level proceedings.

It’s not till at least a couple steps later in the hearings and appeals process – which never happens in a residential case, only for huge commercial properties – that the court or tribunal takes a more formal approach, and is likely to agree that I can accept the building value to lock in the County at that number for the building, and limit the redetermination to just the land value, to try to lower the aggregate total.

Another problem with trying to attack the increased land values is that there aren’t a lot of buildable lots sold separately in the City to refer to as comparables, as there are sales of existing houses (and sales of lots in some suburban areas). Pockets of new residential development in the East End such as Summerset at Frick or Rosemont Lane often don’t have readily available information that breaks down the lot value vs. the building value.

For these reasons, I don’t expect to pursue this approach – that is, focusing on attacking the land value part – very often or with a great deal of success. It still all comes down to trying to prove overall real fair market value.

Feel free to comment, or call if I can help.