Suffolk Tax Grievance Success Stories (Huntington, Smithtown: short sale, real estate, foreclosure)

[Giznot]

Can anyone map out the process, step by step of this grievance process. I found out that I could've walked into my assessor's office and gotten a reduction just on the sale price of the home. Again, please help us to map out this process.

[alexei27]

Originally Posted by Giznot

Can anyone map out the process, step by step of this grievance process. I found out that I could've walked into my assessor's office and gotten a reduction just on the sale price of the home. Again, please help us to map out this process.

Well it may vary from town to town (or county)...so it's probably best to get it straight from the assessor office. In Brookhaven...it is a 4-5 page application on their website which is not very difficult to fill out...and gathering some pretty basic info (from your tax bill mostly). You will also want to get some comparable sales (I asked my realtor to do this for me so I didn't mess it up!


You file all this stuff by whatever the deadline is in your town...and wait until the board makes a decision (you will get a letter).

If you are not happy with the grievance and have data to support it...you can file a small claims review with the courts...this probably adds 6 months onto the process. We had to go that route but it resulted in our taxes being lowered about 3K a year.

Ask any specific questions you have...but the assessors office should be able to help.

[Elke Mariotti]

Originally Posted by alexei27

Well it may vary from town to town (or county)...so it's probably best to get it straight from the assessor office. In Brookhaven...it is a 4-5 page application on their website which is not very difficult to fill out...and gathering some pretty basic info (from your tax bill mostly). You will also want to get some comparable sales (I asked my realtor to do this for me so I didn't mess it up!


You file all this stuff by whatever the deadline is in your town...and wait until the board makes a decision (you will get a letter).

If you are not happy with the grievance and have data to support it...you can file a small claims review with the courts...this probably adds 6 months onto the process. We had to go that route but it resulted in our taxes being lowered about 3K a year.

Ask any specific questions you have...but the assessors office should be able to help.

Great advice, Alexei!
I found the (head) assessor in my town (Town of Huntington) to be extremely helpful. Of course that didn't stop him from giving me less of a reduction than I was convinced I was entitled to

[thebobs]

Yup, just saw your post about this on topix.

[corky101]

Originally Posted by totallyfrazzled

Each town has a cutoff date for changes to the current or upcoming tax bill, so if you close (or grieve) after that date, the changes won't be shown until the next time the Town "runs the numbers". The best thing to do is to call the Town Assessor's office and ask them directly; there's a lot of misinformation out there regarding property tax adjustments.

Here's a question about these Grievance Services that seem to be popping up like woodchucks all over the place: Is there any state regulation of these companies?? Or can anyone literally just print up business cards and flyers and go into business as a greivance service? It seems to me that there is a lot of potential for scams in this area for sure and I'm a little surprised that I haven't yet read of any horror stories ("ABC Grievance Services took our fee and we never heard from them again" etc etc).

I got scammed - the guy took my $250, said I'd get a refund if he didn't get us a tax break. He only filed, it was denied, he never went to court and never gave us our refund. I even took him to small claims court, where I met another family scammed by the same man (but they lost $2000 - but they were paying him for filing for renovations). He agreed to pay me, so we settled. Did he ever pay me? NOPE.

This year I went to Brookhaven Town Hall and did the filing myself, which was very easy to to. Facts are facts, so if this does go to court, I think I can handle that as well. Why pay someone?

[ShellieF]

I'm new to this, so please pardon my ignorance...and thank you for the education.

Is it possible for your taxes to go up if your grievance is denied?

My taxes are not as insane as many areas due to the tax revenue provided by the industrial park in town. Is it still worth it to grieve?

[jpg71]

No, your taxes do not go up due to the grievance process. You've nothing to lose other than court fees, if it comes to that.

[pjs_lori]

Anybody out there who grieved this year in Suffolk and were unfairly denied? They said that I failed to prove market value - I purchased the home for $80k less than it is assessed at, closed on may 18 (the day I filed the grievance), sent them the contract mls listing and 3 comps in the neighborhood. I plan to appeal (due this week) but dont know what else I can do to prove market value...

[mrom123]

I went to view grieveyourtaxes.com website and have 1 word of caution. Most tax grievance cases are denied at the board level. This company appear to only deal with the application to the board for the 99.00 upfront fee.

There is good chance that this will need to be appealed.

[corky101]

Originally Posted by pjs_lori

Anybody out there who grieved this year in Suffolk and were unfairly denied? They said that I failed to prove market value - I purchased the home for $80k less than it is assessed at, closed on may 18 (the day I filed the grievance), sent them the contract mls listing and 3 comps in the neighborhood. I plan to appeal (due this week) but dont know what else I can do to prove market value...

Mine was denied, I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I had a professional appraisal done (since we refinanced) and I used that (there is about a 40k differencne in home value). I guess the next thing is to go to court, but I have no idea how to do that. I should start looking into that.