Understanding Town of Babylon tax re-assessment (Deer Park: for sale, assessor, house)

[The Shaman]

Hi everyone!

My wife and I are looking at homes again (were looking a while back, then traveled for a while instead, now back on the hunt!). We are mostly looking in the town of Babylon (so N. Babylon, W. Babylon, Deer Park, so on). Please pardon anything I may say here that seems ignorant or naive... we're figuring it all out as we go. And from what we've learned so far, if you don't make well-above-average money here on Long Island, the home buying process can be stressful. Somehow we imagined it being different when first started... But we're keeping our heads up!

Anyway -- As we've discovered along the way, it seems a lot of homes for sale have not been assessed for value/taxes by the town since the 1970s all the way through 2000 (most being closer to the 70s, so it's been a while). So at some point, we imagine, the town is going to want to re-assess, and the taxes are going to go from ridiculous to absolutely outrageous. Aside from the fact that these taxes are unsustainable for the average person... here's what we're looking to find out...

If we buy a house that was last assessed in 1980 (for argument's sake) -- what are the chances that this home sale alone will trigger the town to come in and re-assess right away? Is that how it works, or is it more random? And perhaps more importantly, since so many homes have had improvements or additions done to them... what are the chances that having the town come in for permits/COs during the sale process will ALSO trigger them to go ahead and re-assess the home entirely?

We're looking at one now that has a garage extension and porch cover that was added. These items are already taxed by the town (they found out somehow, it seems), BUT the town doesn't have it permitted yet. My understanding is that we should have these exterior items permitted during the sale process, but our concern is that the town will say, "Hey, let's re-assess the whole property while we're at it!" And then we're going in right away with a tax jump.

Anyway, hopefully you can see what our main concern is. What sorts of things trigger a re-assessment of property value and taxes during a home sale, and do things like permits/COs invite the town to re-assess? Can we all expect to have huge tax jumps in the coming years as the town inevitably gets around to re-assessing older homes?

Thanks so much! I really appreciate the insight.

[Kbinspections]

So you would have to find out the assessed value of the home you are looking at, it could be over assessed.

Your taxes go up every year, I'm sure to the town's favor.

I would not worry about an assessor knocking on your door and raising your taxes by 30%. Won't happen.

23 years and we have never be formally assessed. We put an addition on to the house but that square footage was just added on to the original home's valuation, they did not re-assess the entire structure.