Eastern North Carolina {Sand Hills Area} (Raleigh, Sanford: assessor, house, property tax)

[Jim Shearin]

In 1994 we decided to re-locate to Sanford, Lee County, North Carolina. My Son & His wife had made the same decision at about the same time or a little earlier. In his search for a house of his & his wife he came upon a place he thought we would like. We eventually bought the house & 26.98 acres, later we bought approximately 50 acres located beside our tract from the same seller. The property runs from highway #42 about .5 miles pass the west pocket fire department some 5 miles west of Sanford & go's back beyond the Little Pocket Creek. The land is rather hilly & full of rocks & "Red Brick" clay. The price & taxes was reasonable. The first year I purchased the property the Lee County property tax Supervisor did His best to raise our property tax some 32 thousand dollars more than we paid that same year. They have been relentless in raising our property tax to more than triple what it was in 1994. We have no better service at all. The did run County water lines at a cost of some $1000.00 for each meter plus you had to pay $20. each month even if you did not use their water. The Lee County officials turned all the County water system to the Sanford, NC water department. We now must pay double the rate that residents of Sanford, NC pay for water. Another item worth mentioning is if I want to have the water turned on I have to pay a $75. deposit & the minimum bill is $26.95, there is no sewage or garbage pickup by the city or the County. The nearest County dump is 3.5 miles.
We simply pay a lot more for nothing.
Another thing is Lee County only has some 52,000 people & 25000 of those are residents of Sanford, NC. The Lee County Administration cost over $500,000 annually. The Sanford,NC Administration cost over $500,000 annually, The Lee County Sheriff 's Department cost are nearly as high as Wake County {Raleigh} These are simple facts the residents of Sanford and/or Lee County, North Carolina are either paying for dicisions of very stupid administrators or blatent robber's of the taxpayers funds. I am planning on leaving this area as soon as the economy will permit me to sell what property I own in Lee County.

[arbyunc]

Well, you know what they say--death and taxes...

Actually, I took a minute to look up NC county tax rates. The range is from .23 (Carteret County) to 1.06 (Scotland County) per $1,000 valuation. At .75, Lee County is right in the center of the range. So maybe you shouldn't complain--you could be living in Scotland County!

[al_roethlisberger]

Originally Posted by arbyunc

Well, you know what they say--death and taxes...

Actually, I took a minute to look up NC county tax rates. The range is from .23 (Carteret County) to 1.06 (Scotland County) per $1,000 valuation. At .75, Lee County is right in the center of the range. So maybe you shouldn't complain--you could be living in Scotland County!

That's true, and along with the original post, one has to recognize the per capita tax disadvantage a small county like Lee County faces.

Some costs are fixed, and then when one adds the additional costs of covering residents all over the county, that cost has to be spread amongst all residents. If there are few taxpayers, that cost per taxpayer may be higher. In a higher density county, the costs can be defrayed amongst more taxpayers and can possibly lead to lower per capita tax rates. Although to be fair, this isn't always the case in practice. Taxes rarely go DOWN

I will say this though, beware the tax appraiser I found an error on a tax card for a property, called the appraisor/assessor to get a correction which they accomodated. But even though the sqft'age was reduced, the appraised value INCREASED because of improvements to the property! You just can't win



Al

[uncletupelo]

the sandhills is not considered to be estern north carolina by most natives.