Land+taxes, how? (Old Town, Alton: assessor, house, to buy) - Maine (ME) - City-Data Forum

K-Luv · 11-12-2007, 06:23 PM

If I were to buy land, say maybe five acres, and then build a house on it-would I be taxed on the value of the land, the value of the newly built home, or both?

AlisonL · 11-12-2007, 06:50 PM

You would be taxed on both.

maine4.us · 11-12-2007, 08:41 PM

Ad valorem means "according to value". Most all property taxes that are not fee based are ad valorem taxes. It is the value of the property and any improvements made to it. In Maine as you know you pay ad valorem tax on the value of your vehicle. This is assessed in quite a few states. Ad valorem tax on an automobile is in addition to the cost of the tag and registration. Georgia and Maine have hefty ad valorem taxes on autos. One good thing about ad valorem taxes, and that is that they are usually considered tax deductible by the IRS and I suspect most state income taxes.

K-Luv · 11-13-2007, 07:04 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iluvme

Ad valorem means "according to value". Most all property taxes that are not fee based are ad valorem taxes. It is the value of the property and any improvements made to it. In Maine as you know you pay ad valorem tax on the value of your vehicle. This is assessed in quite a few states. Ad valorem tax on an automobile is in addition to the cost of the tag and registration. Georgia and Maine have hefty ad valorem taxes on autos. One good thing about ad valorem taxes, and that is that they are usually considered tax deductible by the IRS and I suspect most state income taxes.

By what criteria is this value assessed? Cost of materials used? Square footage? Comparison to other property?

Submariner · 11-13-2007, 07:12 AM

Maine has numerous systems under which they lock-in the property taxes at a lower valuation. Farming, treegrowth, open-land, are examples of such systems.

Any land of greater than five acres could be in 'treegrowth' so that it's valuation is set in stone at a lower value, depending on the type of trees that you are growing.

Mine valuation is set at $350/acre.

This county's mil rate is 0.00842. Each town/city then adds onto the county's mil rate, as much as they require to cover their operating expenses.

Yesterday I went and visited the city clerks in Alton. Their mil rate is 0.0165, or twice my township's mil rate, and Old Town's mil rate is 0.024.

More municipal services and city employees, requires more tax money, which raises the mil rate.

Maine over-all has a very low property tax on vehicles. I just paid the 'excise' tax [the phrase that Maine uses for vehicle property taxes] on one of my vehicles and I paid $5 for the year.

Anyway my land is taxed at $1.05 per acre each year.

By adding a house on a permanent foundation, the house's value was assessed separately, and taxed at the same mil rate.

They assessed my house to have the same valuation as 225 acres of land would have. Ouch.

But fortunately, at a mil rate of 0.00842 the taxes are not bad.

Had I decided to live in a home on skids [like a movable hunting cabin kind of thing] then they would not have assessed it, and my annual property taxes would only be the $1.05 per acre.

Submariner · 11-13-2007, 07:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by K-Luv

By what criteria is this value assessed? Cost of materials used? Square footage? Comparison to other property?

They did mine from a form that I filled out.

The total square footage, the type of construction [wood stick, concrete, steel], and the cost of materials used.

Those three things was all of the information used.

The assessor has never been to my property.

Northern Maine Land Man · 11-13-2007, 08:02 AM

In order for land to be in Maine's tree growth program the land must be 10 acres or more. It cannot have a house or camp on that 10 acres. To have a house on a property in tree growth the land must be 11 acres or more. Nearly all town itemize their tax bills. They tax you on your land and buildings and add it up for a bottom line.

Maine Writer · 11-13-2007, 10:32 AM

Not all towns tax at the full value so you might have a $100,000 property (house and land combined) but be taxed on 80% of its value. This town has a set amount of acreage as a house lot. I think it's an acre and under. The house lot is taxed at one price and then the rest of the land at another. We hire a professional assessor to do a few buildings each year. The value of the house is one part of the tax and outbulidings can be another (it's not here). Then the value of the land and the buildings are added together and exemptions, such as Homestead and Tree Growth, are subtracted. You can't just declare a piece of land as tree growth. Most towns, or maybe even the state as a whole, require a management plan done by a licensed forester.

Bydand · 11-13-2007, 10:52 AM

Forest, tell the rest of the story on your $5 excise tax vehicle.

1999 GMC Safari van is $84 excise, $25 license plate $12 inspection. All of what you need every year.
1999 Chevy K1500 Suburban $165 excise $25 License plate, $12 Inspection.
Those figures will never go any lower for these vehicles because they are past the 5 years that there is a decrease in excise amount. The amount of excise tax is based on MSRP for the vehicle when new including any accessories. Not what the actual purchase price, or actual value. New trucks can be as high as $700 the first year. If you drive older vehicles it isn't so bad, but anything newer is expensive to register here. It also depends on what town or township you are registering them in. The exact same Suburban is twice the amount of excise tax just 20 miles away. It pays to ask around.

Submariner · 11-13-2007, 01:16 PM

I was not involved in the process of getting this land into 'treegrowth', I bought it already in 'treegrowth'. I did hire a forester to look at my forest and give me a 'Management Plan'. And he notified the state that he had done so.

I made the mistake of taking one acre out of treegrowth for the purpose of building a house.

Now I know better.

Some of my neighbors who also have 'treegrowth' have cabins on their land, and all of their land is in 'treegrowth'.

My Management Plan is a 'boiler-plate', I mean that it is written in a manner such that it would allow a woodlot owner to do anything that involves growing trees. I suspect that Foresters have one 'plan' and they hand the same plan out to every woodlot owner. Nothing in my plan implies that any of it was written customized to any one property.