Just got done with another successful appraisal protest at the Travis Central Appraisal District office.
Unlike the last time, I felt unprepared this year. Last year I procrastinated with sending in a request for appeal until, literary, the last day, the last minute actually, and since it was past their last pick time for the day at the post office, the stamp showed one day later and the district rejected it. Well, this year, I at least sent in the form on time. But then I didn't think I have hard enough data to prove the appraised value was too high.
My house was appraised this year at $190,400. Down from $192K from last year, but I still thought that was high, and especially after I checked the value on Zillow.com and it showed to be around $150K at the beginning of the year. That was a huge drop from $215K in February '11, according to that web site. And not all the areas of my neighborhood showed that drop, so I knew I had to challenge that appraised value.
But my data gathering didn't really start until few days ago. There was one house on my street, very similar to mine, just a bit larger, that was on sale for $189,500, for more than a month, but then it seemed to just disappear from the market. Yesterday morning, I was able to find out that it actually sold for $182,500, with $10K extra to the buyer for repairs. I was going for $187,500 based on that house. That was actually my only argument, but I knew I needed more.
Then just yesterday afternoon, I learned that I wouldn't be able to use a sale from this year to protest the value appraised (but I will for next year!). I was able to get some comps from couple of realtors, and I felt my case was slowly building up. I also remembered, just yesterday, that I might be able to get the appraised value from the refinancing I did back in December, but since it was a no-closing cost refi, the bank didn't order the appraisal again, and just used the previous value of $187,500. Still, I thought that might help, and took with me the refinancing packet from the bank that showed that market value.
So, my 3 arguments for lowering the value to $187,500 were:
1. Market value of $187,500 the bank used
2. Slightly bigger house on my street sold for $182,500.
3. Dozen of comps that sold, or were listed but never sold, in that price range.
I realize a $3K decrease in value is very little, <$100 probably, in taxes, but I felt if I don't challenge this every year, the value just keeps going up, and little by little that adds up.
My informal hearing was scheduled for 8.30am. Reading back on my experience from 2 years ago, I was reminded that I can pretty much show up for this informal hearing any time. I was also surprised that this year I was scheduled 3 months earlier than last time, so I didn't know if that would mean more or less crowds. I showed up at the office at 8:52am, signed in and set down. I was the only one there waiting. In less than couple of minutes someone came and called my property out (again, didn't want to butcher my name), a nice man.
We chatted small talk a bit while he pulled up the records, how he used to live in that neighborhood, I asked about when the county lines were made (there was a map above our heads)... He then briefly showed me the 4 comps the county used. For some reason I didn't receive a copy of those when I requested the appeal (apparently, bellow a check-box, I was supposed to write on a line that I want those copies - good to know for next time). The values were bellow $180,000. He said, based on those, he could go down to $177,400! That's $13K decrease! and I didn't even open my packet, or make any arguments.
There were two houses sold on my street, bigger than mine, so the county calculated their adjusted values, and they were around there. I commented how I didn't even showed him my papers, but he said with that many properties on sale, they can just go by those. So he did. I just signed two papers, and was out by 9:00am.
Another quick and positive experience at TCAD. Another happy customer!
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