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Health & Fitness

Taking Issue with a Marin IJ Housing Market Story

1.18% decline in tax rolls, so how bad of a hit is Marin taking?

On the front page of the Marin Independent Journal on Thursday October 27, 2011 a story was run with the headline, “Nearly a third of property values decline.”  That’s one way to grab eyeballs and sell papers.  In the literal translation I have no doubt this is true, however once you delve into the facts it’s not nearly as daunting as the headlines would suggest.

Buried deep in the second page was this quote, “This year, after a “slightly positive” inflation factor Marin County’s overall assessed valuation, including commercial property, rose .08 percent.”  It’s pretty amazing that one third of property values could decline while the overall assessed valuation rose.  How was that possible?

It’s not like all properties took steep drops in valuations.  On the second to the last paragraph it was pointed out,”… an average valuation might be cut $150,000, providing a $1,500 tax break.”  Those are pretty big numbers and I’m sure a much needed break to the people getting the revaluations, yet the final paragraph tells what I believe to be the real story.

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“On the other hand, some reductions may be so slight that a property owner may not even notice.”  It makes me wonder about the mean and median numbers and the range, all those things my fifth grade daughter is studying now.  What really matters most?

Of greatest impact to Marin residents and homeowners: the decline in property values will lead to a 1.18% cut to the tax revenues, or $670,000.  That’s a lot of money that the county may or may not have been counting on receiving.  The question here, and I don’t have the answer, is what was budgeted by the county in terms of revenue?  Were they anticipating a decline?  If they weren’t, especially in this economy that would be pretty short sighted.

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A decline in the tax rolls of slightly over 1%, while translating into hundreds of millions of dollars should be less than what was budgeted.  If you were to just read the IJ headlines and you were doing the county budget you’d probably be figuring in a much steeper decline.  By my estimation on this line item the county should be flush with funds!

What could have been a more positive headline?  “Property Values Only 1% - County Left with Property Tax Surplus.”  Of course I don’t have the answer to the county budget question, but I have emailed our County Assessor Mr. Richard Benson for clarification.  This is a pretty critical question, and I will report back the answer once I receive it in the comments section so stay tuned for an update.           

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