Assessor Examining Property Values
By Monrovia Weekly
Published: Thursday, March 27th, 2008
Reassessment of L.A. County home values becomes more widespread.
In another sign of the financial times, L.A. County Assessor Rick Auerbach has announced his office is reviewing the assessed valuation of some 310,000 homes in L.A. County.
Auerbach said the review has been completed on some 67,000 properties so far, with 41,000 being reduced an average of $66,000. The change will mean a property tax decrease of about $660 for those reduced.
The elected official said it was his responsibility to ensure that no property owner is over assessed and that because of market conditions, a review of recently sold properties is required.
Auerbach said, “Initially, we began looking at homes and condos that were purchased in the two-year period from July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2007, whether purchased new or as a resale, to determine if a reduction in the property tax assessment is warranted. These properties are the highest priority because they are the most likely to receive a value reduction.”
The assessor said, “Because of what we’ve discovered in this first part of the review, we will now look at properties having purchase dates going back to July 1, 2004.” He also committed to informing owners of properties whose assessed values were reduced by this program by June 30, 2008, allowing them plenty of time to file an appeal with the county’s Assessment Appeals Board if they disagree with the amount of the reduction.
For owners whose properties are not included in the review and believe their property is assessed above its actual value on January 1, 2008, there is a simple method to request a review of their assessed value. Auerbach said those property owners could either download a Decline-in-Value review application from the Assessor’s Website at assessor.lacounty.gov or request an application by calling (888) 807-2111. Auerbach also said that he will issue a final report about the review in June.
Last July, when the decline in home values was beginning to be felt, Auerbach released an historic trillion dollar gross Assessment Roll of $1,037,881,712,280, representing a 9.3 percent increase for the Jan. 1, 2007 property tax lien date.
Home sales and changes of ownership occurring between Jan. 1, 2006 and Dec. 31, 2006, were the largest component of an unprecedented $88.1 billion increase over the previous gross roll of $950 billion.
The net local roll (after exemptions and excluding utilities assessed by the Board of Equalization) totaled $998 billion, compared to the $914 billion in 2006, for a revenue-producing increase of 9.2 percent.
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