Anyone e-file their property taxes? I got a CMA from my realator. Just curious how successful this would be. Also which value should i use Average or Lower?

TIA

Faxed in protest yesterday! Fight'em annually. I always check the equity and market boxes, then ask for evidence and go from there. Always prep with multiple arguments.

valtosca said:

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Faxed in protest yesterday! Fight'em annually. I always check the equity and market boxes, then ask for evidence and go from there. Always prep with multiple arguments.

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Ditto. I e-filed my protest yesterday too.

I e-filed. Wrote up why I disagreed with their valuation in the comments. They gave me a settlement I thought was very fair. Property value still went up, but it basically went up to what I paid for it and significantly less than their original valuation.

Was pretty painless.

I have a hearing set up for 6/11. I got the evidence package today. I plan to take a bunch of photos and caption them to prove issues. Any other advice to have in the folder?

Tony Franklins Other Shoe said:

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I have a hearing set up for 6/11. I got the evidence package today. I plan to take a bunch of photos and caption them to prove issues. Any other advice to have in the folder?

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What kinds of photos?

I usually have photos of deferred maintenance and repairs I need to have done to my house. I also have cost estimates for the repairs to get them to knock that value off the appraisal.

Yes. Those kind. Had a squirrel chew a hole through siding and a resulting storm caused some leaks. Couple that it's some areas of dry rot and deck issues.

Also seems like a lot of the comps are for 2 story houses and mine is a single story. Haven't dove much into the numbers yet.

Tony Franklins Other Shoe said:

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Yes. Those kind. Had a squirrel chew a hole through siding and a resulting storm caused some leaks. Couple that it's some areas of dry rot and deck issues.

Also seems like a lot of the comps are for 2 story houses and mine is a single story. Haven't dove much into the numbers yet.

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Good. They want to see data so they can explain to their bosses why they are lowering their appraisal. They won't do it just because they are feeling generous . Numbers matter to them so give them numbers that make sense.

i think i missed the deadline. is there anything i can do at this point?

Easy stuff. When I looked at their evidence package, too many houses in the hood are selling and they had plenty of back up. The data I looked at also told a pretty solid story that I didn't have much of a case, I was actually on the low side of sq ft pricing. My only issue was that the bulk of their comps were 2 story houses, most with pools and mostly redone inside compared to my 1 story. They only had a couple of one story examples that to me were real comps. But pricing was still in the ball park.

I took in 10 pictures of issues, had a quote to back it up and they knocked off 40%, it wasn't $ for $, but they weren't too far off. That was about a $440 savings over the year. Took all of an hour to drive down, meet, and drive back to work. Spent an hour or so looking through BCAD records and making my spreadsheet.

FWIW, there's no real value difference in a one story versus two. In most cases at least. There's usually something else going on with the property. Pools though, toss those out as "comps."

The people at CAD are pretty reasonable folk as long as you treat them alright.

If you submit photos I believe they keep them in the file so you can't use them again. Not 100% sure about that though.

yeah, my biggest problem is that there are enough comps out there to keep it single story versus two story. I think it muddies the waters unnecessarily since the burden of proof is on the homeowner.

When the guy introduced himself, he said "how are you doing today?" I said I'm itching for a fight. He did a quick double take and quickly figured out I was messing with him. I thought he did a great job and he did keep the photos, he asked if he could and I was prepared with extra.