Seems like every month the value of our home drops and with how many recent foreclosures in my hood alone, its only getting worse yet I still pay $3880 in property taxes. Is there a way to get it reduced? city of milwaukee btw.
Seems like every month the value of our home drops and with how many recent foreclosures in my hood alone, its only getting worse yet I still pay $3880 in property taxes. Is there a way to get it reduced? city of milwaukee btw.
I know there is a certain date you can go appeal in Greenfield. Best thing is contact the City http://city.milwaukee.gov/AppealsandAssistance674.htm
Yup usually only one month that you can apply for a reassessment. I fought my assessment 2 years ago and won despite everyone on BCM telling me I wouldn't have any success :)
I fought back hard in Oak Creek a few years back when the crash happened and they had me assessed crazy still. Largely it was a waste of my time I had Remax and Shorewest both give me appraisals, I had literally dozens of comparable sales printed out, newspaper article after article about falling prices etc.
When all was said and done, the "board" (made up of random residents that apparently know little about anything other than whoever they knew to get on said board) actually said "wow you did a great job and have lots of supporting info, but we have to go with Marty (the assessor).
Marty, the assessor, had 3 comparable sales on his printout from his program he uses... The main one was from 3 years prior when I HAD BOUGHT THE HOUSE near the peak, and his program claimed values went up 8% or whatever per year since then. This was right in the middle of the housing crash lol. It was ridiculous I was like don't you people even pick up a newspaper????
They also told me "well you are only arguing about a 15%-20% or so difference what is the big deal why bother" to which I replied "if the 15%-20% of my $5500 tax bill so like $1000 per year is no big deal to you guys I would happily accept a check from one of you"
I was super pissed and frustrated, and the next step after the two hearings I could do myself was to have to hire a lawyer so I didn't go any further.
Now this year during their reassessment mine did drop a TON, and my taxes dropped to $4800 so mine must have dropped comparibly more than most people or the average for my taxes to have dropped so I am actually wondering if they "remembered" me or whatever and actually adjusted it.
On my house, there is a $20,000 difference between my city assessed value and the last 2 appraisals. This is also after nearly $30,000 in windows and siding.
I don't know what I am more mad about... The house being appraised (worth) less after spending more money on it, or the city taxing me more than it's "worth".
All the assessment is your homes relative value to your area, so if all homes are below value, you are still paying your "fair share" of taxes. This is the case in most or all of Milwaukee County to some extent I think. Put it this way, if everyone's property dropped to the "real value" all that will occur is raising the tax rate to make up for it. Unless slashing services by 1/4 (or more in some areas) or something is going to happen, I don't care how anti-government someone is but that's not reality.
We dropped our assessed value this summer in West Allis, simply sent a copy of our appraisal when trying to refinance. Dropped it about 18k with little to no effort. We could of fought it further but think it was fair. Still 37k over the appraised value :mad: but maybe 10k over what we really can get. The appraisal was pretty out of whack, IMO. This saved us about $450 in taxes this year, paying for the appraisal and will help us in years to come as well. Municipalities have what's called open book once a year, but that is if you take it all the way to the assessor or a meeting of some sort. You can most likely lower it before and after that most likely, depending on where you live and your assessor. If you meet some resistance from the assessor be prepared to state your case with comps and do some leg work to prove your case in lowering the value.
Old thread. but I think the topic is still relevant, if not more so, considering the housing market is beginning to "recover" some...
Here is my case...
Bought a house last summer in New Berlin in the Weatherstone subdivision. Place was a foreclosure, and as such got a great deal on it. Now a month or so before we first looked at the house the bank pulled out the in-ground pool. Filled it in, but the company used did a piss-poor job of it, so the backyard is mostly trashed because of it. When we moved in, in July, it had weeds that were waist high (and a bitch to cleanup). They also cutout a section of the wrought-iron fence to get the dump-truck in/out as well (fixed that since and made it removable in-case I want to get machinery in/out at any point myself).
Now, about a month after we closed and moved in I got a letter from the city assessor stating they wanted to reassess the property. Now, since I just moved in (and not really done unpacking or getting organized yet) and haven't had a chance to do anything to the place I really didn't feel comfortable letting someone start wandering around and run the risk of them upping my taxes. I mean quite honestly I had no clue if the previous owner (who also built the house) ever let the assessor in at any point and really didn't want to run the very real risk of them assessing me much higher than it already was, and for reference my taxes are much higher than 90%+ of the rest of the home in the Weatherstone subdivision as the house is assessed much higher than most already, so any risk of increasing my taxes over the ~65-70% higher rate than that of anyone around me is something I want to avoid at all costs.
But, I did ask the assessor if they would reassess based upon the selling price and he explained since it wasn't a arms-length sale he couldn't do that. I mentioned that I wasn't comfortable allowing someone walk through the house right now, which he said was fine as it was my choice, but that I had no problem with him walking around the outside of the home, especially considering that the in-ground pool was removed. He jumped at that opportunity and was at my place within 20 minutes. I walked him around the outside of the house and when he saw the state of the backyard he was quick to point out that, yes, the in-ground pool was definitely gone. I asked him about it dropping my tax assessment and he mentioned it would not apply to my current years taxes, but would show up in next years tax assessment. He said to get an adjustment to this years taxes he would have to do a walk-through and then could do an immediate reassessment.
So, I am now waiting to see what my taxes will be like this year. I can't possibly see how they can go up, but I guess I will have to wait and see. I will be really pissed if they were to increase. Granted I have a pretty big house, even compared to most around here, but I pay so damn much in New Berlin it feels like I am living in Milwaukee. I mean outside of the taxes I also have the water/sewer bill, the garbage collection, etc... Oh the joys of home ownership...
You don't see HOW they can go up? Boy do you have a lot to learn about home ownership in SE WI lol. Plan on property taxes and assessment going up "just cuz." Even when our property value was going down, taxes went up almost $800 this year. You always have the option of fighting the assessment however if you think you are wrongly assessed. And in many cases, that is the right thing to do
Well, I spoke just barely too soon and I just got my new assessment in the mail today and my assessment dropped by only $3k... You sure as hell know if someone puts in a new in-ground pool their tax assessment would go up by at least $15k-20k... What a joke...
Oh, and I know shit just changes for just about any reason, just that this place has not has it's taxes reassessed for a number of years and with the missing pool and all it would be hard for them to justify an increase considering that and the falling home values in general...
As long as you can prove that nearly every home within 2 miles of you house has dropped in value than you might have a case to fight your assessment. It's tough but worth the effort.
I wouldn't expect an assessment to change much with or without a pool, since it doesn't really add value to a house when selling. I'd be pretty happy with a drop of any kind.
We bought our home in New Berlin almost three months ago and just received our letter this week. I don't expect much of a change once they go through, but we did pay a little less than assessed and it was an arms length sale.