After making modest improvements to her sunroom and garage of her Glenmont home, Carol Grap expected an increase in her property value.
But certainly, she said, not $100,000.
“They assessed me at the height of the housing bubble, but that bubble has burst,” Grap said. “I don’t want to be priced out of my house.”
Grap is one of more than 49,000 Marylanders to appeal their assessments or request out-of-cycle reassessments this year. Assessment supervisors said they are just now recovering from the “tremendous” surge in cases.
In Harford County assessment supervisor Donald Beynon called it the “three-headed monster” —increased taxes, higher assessments, and the collapse of the housing market.
His office, which normally handles 800 to 900 appeals each year, tackled 2,400.
“We were swamped,” Beynon said. “We’re just now caught up.”
Current assessments reviewed fair market value through 2007, said Kent Finkelsen, who oversees the state’s appeal boards.
Finkelsen said 20 to 25 percent of assessments are reduced prior to the final stage of the process, tax court.
Even amid the current downturn, assessors said there is no guarantee home values will decrease during the next 3-year cycle.
“We are seeing values come down on more expensive homes, but lower-priced homes are still going up,” said James Roesner, assessment supervisor for Baltimore County. “It will be different things in different areas.”
Roesner said his office saw a third more appeals than usual and a slight uptick in petitions for reassessment since the downturn in the market. In Anne Arundel, those requests are up nearly 20 percent and in Carroll, between 30 and 40 percent, officials said.
The backlog means some residents have waited longer for hearings to argue their cases before their local appeals board.
Warren Boyd said his Phoenix home was assessed at the peak of the housing boom in 2005, nearly doubling its value. On top of the economic downturn, a chronically eroding backyard should have curtailed the dramatic increase, he said.
“I got the notice in January and it was almost unbelievable,” Boyd said. “Right away, I sent it back to ask for a hearing.”
