Comment by hippich | Hacker News Reader

Comment by hippich | Hacker News Reader

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Just finished formal hearing for my property valuation protest at Travis arb (via phone). The district representative essentially reiterated same numbers they provided in the evidence. They did not bring any new evidence, not were able to clarify how these evidence relate to my property. My lot was assessed at $584k, while neighbors slightly larger one is at 100k. When I tried to probe why my lot is classified and appraised differently from the immediate neighbor's one, his answer was essentially "this is how we classify it". 3 acres lots with water access in my neighborhood appraised at $300k while my 2.7ac lot without water access appraised at $584k. Many lots around mine did not change appraised value at all. The lot that was sold two years ago for $120k (i know because I wanted to buy it but was too slow) - now appraised at almost $800k - no way it could increase that much.... Basically, numbers are all over the place and the representative couldn't really explain why.

Yet, the independent panel after not hearing any meaningful explanation from the district representative and hearing my examples of how numbers been all over the place, in the 3 to 0 vote voted to side with district's valuation recommendation...

I guess I will wait for the ARB's official letter and have to head to the court, since numbers just do not make sense.

This is why appraisals for tax purposes should always come with the right to sell the property back to the city for 90% of this value. If you won't pay $900k for a $1m home, then it isn't a $1m home.

Also, there should be carveouts (like we have in Toronto) for the elderly and disabled to have their taxes paid from the residual value of their home until they die, so our communities don't just push out our most vulnerable fifth of society when housing booms.

Hard to imagine a local city has the funds available to just buy up property.

I’m also not sure “punishing” (well now you have to buy it) local municipalities results in better governance.

Also sounds like an invite for corruption. Evaluate high, sell to the city… now the locals are all on the hook.

If the city can buy property at 90% of appraised value, they can sell to the market at true market value. As long as their appraised value is accurate, they profit from this arrangement.

It provides the proper incentive to align appraisals with market value and prevents the city from exploiting its citizens.

I think you're missing the point - that system invites corruption of the appraiser. There's a nice kickback in it for someone who artificially inflates the appraisal of a worthless property and, forcing the city to buy it from the owner who is in cahoots with the appraiser. Leaving the citizens holding the bag of course.

That will become apparent as soon as the city is stuck holding a property it can't sell back to the open market and the appraiser will quickly find himself audited.

Why wouldn't a city use an independent appraiser to vet those numbers?

It’s an interesting idea, a few loopholes come to mind:

If the option to sell is at anytime through the year, there is the risk of city being on the hook when values tank across the board. If the exercise window is only say a month after the appraisal this risk is diminished.

I could see this system being used to exploit uneducated homeowners and essentially con them into selling below market value. Not sure how to lower the risk of this one happening.

1. I would expect the window would be the same as you have now to contest the value. Ideally nobody would exercise this right since it is essentially an SLA for government assessment quality. Everyone would rather have an assessment be consistent and slightly conservative than arbitrary and inflated.

2. I don't see the exploit? If they sell below market value then the government gets the profit.

> Hard to imagine a local city has the funds available to just buy up property.

Hard to imagine the US government has 1.5 trillion lying around to pay people to stay home, but they figured it out.

Unfortunately the local city can’t just print more money. I suspect they could raise property taxes instead though.

I'm sure they'll figure it out.

Local cities /= federal government.

It doesn’t have to be the city. you can imagine an interesting system where instead of an appraisal, every property owner puts their own valuation and computes their own tax. The catch is that anyone is able to buy the property at the assessed price for cash, without any negotiations or any opportunity to match. You will see tax evasion go to zero immediately and enforcement cost will also be zero.

I think such a system, while good for theoretical discussion, would be ripe for all manners of abuse and problems as proposed. Perhaps in the ideal free market where everyone is equally educated on property values it might make sense. But such a reality will never exist.

This is Henry George's land value tax, articulated well in the second greatest economics book of all time, Progress and Poverty

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgism?wprov=sfla1

> The catch is that anyone is able to buy the property at the assessed price for cash, without any negotiations or any opportunity to match.

Sounds like I lost all my property rights right there…

That option is available to the elderly or disabled: https://www.star-telegram.com/opinion/bud-kennedy/article262...

"If you’re age 65 or older or fit one of several other categories, you don’t ever have to pay the property tax on your homestead right now at all. Get a tax bill? Forget it. If you file an affidavit, your tax bill is magically delayed. Nobody collects until you move on."

I like this idea a lot. Only, I'd stipulate that the city should not have an opportunity to refuse the sell.

I believe this is part of the premise on how Wealth Tax is supposed to work. While I'm not a big fan of Wealth Tax, I do think this is an idea that should/can be used across the tax system.

What evidence did you present? Did you take comps - sales comps and/or equity comps? You may be aware already, but in general, people take photos of their property that need repairs e.g., cracks in slab/foundation, leaky roof, mold infection etc.

There were little conversation about the improvement itself. It was pretty spot on (I know, because we built this house). The problem was with their appraisal of the land. There are no comps in the area, and explanation why my lot has 275% multiplier while neighbor's one has 100% was "we assess their lot as a plot, and yours as acreage". My lot is slightly smaller then my neighbors. Two of these lots sit next to each other on the same street... No explanation why it is treated differently.

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