Something must be done about HCAD

[PedroMartinez]

Originally Posted by Hangster

The huge increase they showed on your neighbor is the market value, not the appraised value. If you have homestead, the appraised is capped as you probably are aware. The appraised value is an increase of 10%, which given the market, might be a tough value to argue against. The market value should reflect what the market should pay for the house. Without knowing the details of home value increases for your area in the last year, its hard to say if the market value increase they came up with is valid or not. Your tax is not on the market value, just the appraised value, since that is the value that you are taxed on. The market value is how they track the house value on the market should you sell your house, then that is the value that will be set as the appraised value for the next owner, which will bring that taxed amount up to the market value at that point for the new owner. As others have mentioned, if you had sales comp data, then they will take that as the value, but I would guess that if you had sales comp data, it might reflect what they already show as market value and you will probably not get much reduction if any. Having recently sold comps data will bring down the market value, which is the main driving factor in bringing down the appraised value. The goal is to get them to lower the appraised, and one way to do that is to show the market value has reduced to a point where its lower than the appraised value or at least have an affect on the reduction of the appraised value.

I completely understand the difference between appraisal and market. The thing is that once HCAD increases their market, they will do the maximum increase (in the case of homestead - 10%) each year until they reach that market. After they 'establish' market, it is very difficult to have them reduce it. With my neighbor having a 30% increase in market and 10% in appraisal, it would be very difficult to argue either my market lower which will effect appraisal. Additionally, I've found that the ARB usually tries to compromise; therefore, even if my neighbor successfully fought the 30%, he'd most likely walk away with a 15% to 20% market value increase which HCAD would try to reach with appraisal by doing the maximum increases along the way.

The big problem for me was the complete lack of any comp sales in my 'neighborhood' for the year - HCAD said there were none, and the extremely limited number of canal front homes on the entire lake. Like I said, my argument was over land value and I have numbers while HCAD presented NONE.

[Hangster]

Yeah, I can absolutely see where you are coming from. If there were no sales in your neighborhood, did you look for comp sales outside of your neighborhood. Private appraisers would look for comps outside of the neighborhood when there are no comps in the neighborhood. Either way, I know its after the fact for you now, but hopefully you will have better luck next year.

[PedroMartinez]

Originally Posted by Hangster

Yeah, I can absolutely see where you are coming from. If there were no sales in your neighborhood, did you look for comp sales outside of your neighborhood. Private appraisers would look for comps outside of the neighborhood when there are no comps in the neighborhood. Either way, I know its after the fact for you now, but hopefully you will have better luck next year.

Yes, I looked for comps outside of my neighborhood; however, those were in much pricier neighborhoods where a non-waterfront property went for more than double what non-waterfront properties in my neighborhood went for, and this was also true for canal front and lakefront properties. Therefore, I had to show the valuation % difference between canal, lake and non-water in order to show the variations. This was in my documentation.

I could not say, over in neighborhood X the canal front went for Y so mine should also be Y, because all property in that neighborhood is substantially higher.

[usc619]

Originally Posted by PedroMartinez

It sounds like we need a state income tax and a big state sales tax to go along with our property taxes which also need to be increased. You do feel that about 50% of our total income should go to the State Of Texas, correct? Please tell me you aren't one of these guys who doesn't want schools are roads.

Nah, I pay my part and keep it moving. I'm one of those folks that understand the money needs to come from somewhere.

[Tropicamide]

Originally Posted by predatorprey

I do not know if it's ridgged or not, but I recall reading that the protest success rate was very low for those who represent themselves.

I definitely agree with you, I've fought it myself for a couple of years and gave up. The ARB would ignore what I presented and take the side of HCAD.

Are the members of the ARB not paid by HCAD? Would he/she be let go if they sided often with the property owners? Hmmm things to think about.

[crone]

If there were no land sales, did the HCA just allocate every lot value?

My neighbor had about the same house as mine, age, floor plan, builder, stuff. But she had 80,000 foot lot to my 12000. Our lots never changed value in 18 years. Her was always $10,000 more than mine. The thing was, we were both on a paved street, had utilities, etc. Size did not matter but that other stuff did.

My current next door neighbor is valued at 5$ a foot more than mine. His is a one story and much smaller. But he has the same number of bathrooms and a kitchen. That's where the cost is. Building the same house only bigger cost less.

We protest almost every year. They say on the website that each ARB hearing has 15-20 minutes, start to finish. How are they going to absorb your 100+ pages and listen to what you are saying in 15 minutes?

IMO, one needs to be specific.

Go back next year. Follow the instructions. If they do the classes again on how to protest, we all need to attend.

Just my 2 cents.

[KatieKennedy]

If you are not satisfied with the ARB decision, you should bring a lawsuit. Watch that you do not miss the time limit for appealing from the HCAD decision. You can represent yourself, but there is an old saying that the person that represents himself has a fool for a client. The tax protest firms work with lawyers that go to court on your behalf. HCAD is also represented by lawyers, usually from Olson & Olson. If you win, the lawyers/tax protest firms take a percentage of the tax savings. Most of these cases settle at some point prior to trial.

[PedroMartinez]

Originally Posted by KatieKennedy

If you are not satisfied with the ARB decision, you should bring a lawsuit. Watch that you do not miss the time limit for appealing from the HCAD decision. You can represent yourself, but there is an old saying that the person that represents himself has a fool for a client. The tax protest firms work with lawyers that go to court on your behalf. HCAD is also represented by lawyers, usually from Olson & Olson. If you win, the lawyers/tax protest firms take a percentage of the tax savings. Most of these cases settle at some point prior to trial.

So, go along with this lobbyist style cottage industry based upon a crappy system revolving around HCAD officials going to work at these private firms and using their insider contacts and knowledge of the tricks to ensure that you have to pay for their services.

The answer to this problem is not playing their game.

[crone]

I vote for Pedro.

It is a rotten system and everybody knows it. When the state can say we know the way we fund schools is against what the courts have decided but we are doing it anyway. The entire taxing and funding system is called into question. The people who are doing it to us are playing musical jobs. That is why we decided to buy an older ragged out house in the county, and redo ourselves. The tax man does not know if it is mold or gold on the inside. All they know is what we paid.

Wonder if there is public information on how well these lower your taxes firms do. Betcha those folks who do their own protesting, as a whole, get better results than the firms.