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Smawgunner
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 11:20am
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We bought 84 acres in Athens county Ohio. The taxes at the time for the previous owner were 1000.00 per year. We just got our first tax bill for the year and it is now 1600.00 per year!!! WTH? It has a very old run down cabin on it that we have done extensive work to and I'm afraid if I dispute it, they will come out to reassess and then find it should be even MORE than 1600.00!
Anyone have experience with disputing property taxes and if so how did you get comparables and what other info did you provide? And did they come back out to physically reassess your property?
Thanks!
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 11:42am
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First question I'd ask is whether they increased the tax because of improvements to the property, or because they re-assessed the value of the land alone, or if there was a change in county tax rate. You can't fight it til you know what they did and why. In most areas they won't increase your taxes for repair and remodel, only for additions to your existing square footage. As I recall you reduced your square footage, so if part of your tax base is the total square footage of the building including the shed roof addition you ripped off, maybe you have an argument to lower your base, but I doubt they'll go for that.
What's it say on the bill you got?
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beachman
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 11:47am
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Join the club. Our taxes went from about $700 to $2,000!!! We are water access only and would have a hard time to sell at the assessed value. But, they might assess more. Kind of like legalized extortion!
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Just
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 11:56am
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IF you paid 150% of the previous assed value ,your taxes will go up 50% +this years increase . check last years assessment .
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 11:57am
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Where I am there is an appeals process if you believe the assessed value is too high. I'm sure the process varies from place to place.
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hattie
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 12:11pm
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Quite often they look at the average selling price of houses in your area. If someone builds a really fancy place or complex of places, it could affect your rates. You can appeal this though. Here in Canada many people who appeal do actually win the appeal. If you can find some documentation of places similar to yours that have recently sold and they are valued low, you could use that in your appeal. Having said that, we are in Canada, so I don't know if the process is the same in the States.
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buckybuck
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 01:35pm
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Until this year, taxes for my 14 acres just west of you in Vinton County were $17 a year. However, I about had a heart attack last month when my new tax bill came, and it was for a whopping $78! Long story short, someone had screwed up when I'd bought the property, and I'd been paying taxes on someone else's property until this year.
That still didn't explain the huge jump. It turns out that the tax bill that I received this year did not have the Current Agricultural Use Value (CAUV) offset applied, which had been applied on the other land. About a year ago, I had worked with the local Soil and Water Conservation District to make sure that I was in compliance with CAUV timberland requirements on the wooded part of my property, so once the county auditor's office squared things away with the Soil and Waver Conservation District staff, I got a new, lowered tax bill. It didn't go all the way down to $17 again, but that's probably reasonable, since I later discovered that there was no road access to the piece of land that I had originally been paying taxes on.
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Smawgunner
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 02:03pm - Edited by: Smawgunner
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Quoting: bldginsp As I recall you reduced your square footage, so if part of your tax base is the total square footage of the building including the shed roof addition you ripped off, maybe you have an argument to lower your base, but I doubt they'll go for that.
Thanks for following my project bldginsp. You are right, we didn't add anything but did delete the back addition so no additional structures. The tax bill did not indicate anything but when I spoke to the auditors office, they were perplexed that the taxes rose so much. It was explained that the taxes were based off the value and that the value skyrocketed when I bough the land. I was directed to their website to download a form to start the dispute process, but all I found was a procedure and not the form. I'm going to have to call them back. I'm just afraid they will send someone out and see my "improvements" to the structure and raise it further. Stay tuned! 
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 02:42pm
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They should make available to you a complete record of what they know about the property and what the basis is for taxes. In your case I wouldn't be surprised if they don't even have that house on their records at all, so yeah, if you tell them about it they might bump your taxes. All depends on what the local laws say they can tax, and how they decide the issue if you happen to fall into a grey area.
Good luck, keep us informed
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cabinbiscuits
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 02:54pm
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After we bought our land we discovered a method of reassessment that I did not know existed. I had never heard of it before. I have always seen reassessments done either on a county wide basis or a partial county basis by the taxing authorities. They do this every so often, and sometimes that (every so often) is not very often at all depending on the particular municipality.
When we bought our mountain land, the school district appealed our land's assessment and that of all of the other deed transfers where the sale price was higher than the assessed value that the county had on record. They had our assessed value on our land raised from what it had been for the 30 or so years since the last time the deed transferred to the previous guy that owned it, to exactly what we paid for it on the deed. Obviously that makes the fair market value the new assessed value and resulted in a significant tax increase for us.
I think the previous owner used to pay a total of around $300 or so a year and the first tax bill we got was for around $1400 or so a year. When I called the tax office the lady I talked to was very helpful and felt bad for us, saying that the realtor that we bought the property through certainly knows that this kind of thing occurs in that county and should have warned us. Of course the realtor must have forgotten to mention that.
The helpful tax office lady said I could certainly appeal the new assessment as many people before me have, but since they are using the actually sale value of the property unless you can prove the value went down after you paid for it, you won't win.
Anyway in Pennsylvania we have something called Clean and Green which is an incentive to keep tracts of land over ten acres undeveloped, and if you do place your land in the program they give you a significant break on the property taxes. I had to pay the higher tax for that first year but put our property in the Clean and Green program for the next year. This resulted in lowering our overall property tax bill to less than $200 a year which is less than the previous owner used to pay. Now the greedy school district will get less than they used to as long as I own the property.
Most of the people that have land in the area around our land do not have their land in the program. I can tell because you can see it on the county tax website. They could be saving significant tax money if they did.
Anyway check and see if your state or province has a program similar to what we have in Pennsylvania, it could save you a ton of money if you do.
Biscuits
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Smawgunner
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 04:33pm
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Quoting: buckybuck It turns out that the tax bill that I received this year did not have the Current Agricultural Use Value (CAUV) offset applied, which had been applied on the other land.
My neighbor has this and it does help out. We're going to pursue CAUV. I also failed to mention that the neighbor's tax rate around us did not increase.
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MtnDon
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 05:01pm
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It is common that the taxes increase when there is a sale, a change of ownership. The rates on existing and continuing ownerships may only increase every few years when reassessments are done.
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Mike 870
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 06:38pm
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Smawgunner, the auditors office will answer all those questions you have. They will tell you the basis of your valuation, you can probably also see it on the auditors web site. My guess is that because there is a house on it they used the sale value as the basis. I'm told on raw land they use a set value per acre based on what the land is (farm, timber etc.). I am going to look into my taxes which I think are high at 575 a year. I will let you know what I find out. On my primary residence, I fought my valuation locally, and then to the state supreme court in Columbus. I won because I just wanted it valued based on what I had paid for it a year earlier. The local board of appeals tried to appease me by lowering it to halfway between it's current valuation and what I paid for it happening I wouldn't fight it in Columbus, but I took the time to file the paperwork and won. I even waived my right to be there and asked that they hold the hearing without me because I knew I would win and the county lawyers wouldn't bother showing up.
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VC_fan
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 07:18pm
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OK, another thing I love about Vinton County... We bought our place about 15 years ago. When we got our first tax bill it went through the roof compared to what the prior owner had been paying (10X). I called and asked as politely as I could about that. There were a couple of questions about who owned the adjacent properties so they could compare. After a couple of minutes the auditor or treasurer (I can't remember which) said, "You're right. Don't pay it. I'll send out a new one." And it dropped to a number that was maybe 50% higher per acre than what the prior owner had been before the split but still extremely reasonable. Fast forward 15 years. We just sold off about 25% of a property we own. I got the tax bill for the remaining 75% and it had gone up to a number a little higher than it had been when we owned it all. I called the number on the tax bill and asked, again as politely as I could. The auditor said, "You're right. These splits are confusing. Don't pay it. I'll send out a new one." And they did - it took it back down to what it had been per acre and now based on fewer acres. Suggestion: in these small rural counties, ask nicely about something that seems out of line. It may not get you anywhere but they also may genuinely try to help you. At least that's been my experience in one rural county in Ohio. Good luck!
Oh, the recent sale was for land that's in CAUV. It was in CAUV when we bought it. You do need to apply each year to keep it in the program and I think in Ohio the first time you apply there's a small application fee. After that, the forms are due some time in March (I think) and you just say it's still used for agricultural use and the county's welcome to come and inspect it. I understand that under this program, there are indeed set values for pastureland, cropland, and timberland and that's what's assessed - no relation to what you actually pay.
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SE Ohio
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# Posted: 5 Mar 2014 07:25pm
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In several SE Ohio counties, we share the same property assessor. One guy. He visits all the properties in several counties on a regular basis, more frequently when a property changes hands; he might visit yearly looking for taxable improvements.
We were assessed after we bought and got a big tax bump. I called and found out we were considered full time residents, with cleared (tillable) land. We're weekenders and all wooded. They made a correction ( not as good as my Vinton Co neighbor above) and dropped our rate. Getting a refund for overpayment in Ohio is another issue (to much work for my overpayment).
They do consider any permanent structure a taxable improvement in Ohio. If you have acreage, you can try and hide new structures from the on-foot assessor (and Sat pictures)
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TheCabinCalls
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 07:22am
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Smawgunner our taxes almost doubled too. I think the rural areas are checking out properties more indepth because our tax audit has very detailed things - down to mechanicals. They also just guessed at things in our cabin. I called and explained we didn't have all of these things and they decreased the amount the property was worth. I still felt is should be lower so they said I had until March 31st to make a request for an adjustment in 2014. So call the auditor and get a statement and make a request. I am going off comps in the area that have more land and cabin, but are cheaper. Hopefully it works.
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turkeyhunter
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 07:49am
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taxes going up!! another reason for letting the tax/building/zoning people know what you are doing on YOUR land...proper permits...etc...NOT!!!!
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Bevis
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 02:57pm
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Quoting: turkeyhunter taxes going up!! another reason for letting the tax/building/zoning people know what you are doing on YOUR land...proper permits...etc...NOT!!!!
I agree. 
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Smawgunner
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 04:14pm
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Update: Pays to call twice. The first guy I spoke to seemed a bit new and didn't offer up much. The lady I spoke to today did some digging and found out the OFTL (Ohio Foresty Tax Law) program that the property was in expired (good for 5 years). So I have to reapply. They will give us a management plan and we have to mark boundaries, keep invasives in check etc. etc. So there you have it. Looks like this year I'm screwed and next year should have the taxes reduced by 50%.
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bldginsp
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 05:06pm
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Persistence pays. Congratulations. Now you hammer them to get the tax reduced for this year because you didn't know about the forestry thing, and in effect you have met all its requirements since nothing has changed on the lot. Make a pest of yourself and they'll give it to you just to get rid of you. Just be a polite pest, if you know what I mean.
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toyota_mdt_tech
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# Posted: 6 Mar 2014 08:40pm
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My 20 acres started out at $23 a year and has creeped up to about $32 now. I did add the cabin and now its a total of 209, creeps up each year by a little. Was $197 when I finished the cabin. I still have 19.25 acres in timber status, while they removed 1 acres for the homesite. So the one acres is not in timber status, just regular taxable land, plus the cabin. I am about to pick up another 20 east of mine, this will add to my taxes, but it will remian full timer status, about $32 a year more.
I am considered a "timber farmer" and if you have 20 acres or more, eligible for this program in my state. They say I am supplying the community with "wood fiber" (timber farm)
I had to hire a forester and have them do a forest management plan. Cost was $350, I could of done it myself, but had no idea what was needed. I think I have to submit a new one after 10 years.
There would normally have to be a harvest plan, but they changed the law, they said that old growth is also beneficial to the community and a harvest date is no longer required.
I am considered a small forest land owner (SFLO) by my states dept of natural resources and on their mailer for lots of nice information etc.
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tfsimmons
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# Posted: 30 Jan 2015 05:23pm
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I'm not a "timber farmer", but I guess I am considered a "rancher", although my only dealings with cattle involves a knife and fork.
Utah has the "Greenbelt Act" which allows agricultural property to be taxed based upon its productive capabilities instead of the market value.
Our landowners association allows a rancher to run some cattle on the properties (for a fee that helps maintain our dirt roads) which qualifies us for the greenbelt tax status, if we sign up for it, so I only pay about $5 for property tax on my 10.5 acres. Our area is currently zoned as recreational property, so we cant build permanent structures. I keep a couple of trailers parked there year-round.
It helps to remind myself of that nice tax break when I have to shovel a cow pie from the trail or around our camp area.
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