1. there was a home on the parcel in years 2001, 2002 and 2003 and 2004.  If the parcel was a vacant lot in any year, it was not included so as not to skew the report.

2. the home was included in the reassessment of Neighborhood Code 4801 in 2003.  The column is highlighted in blue for the year 2003, the year of the reassessment in Neighborhood Code 4801.  The report is currently sorted by the address of the parcels.

For this neighborhood code, I have created two reports--Report 1 for the parcels that were actually reassessed in Neighborhood Code 4801 in 2003 and Report 2 contains two different groups--Group 1 and Group 2 on one spreadsheet for the parcels that were subsequently moved in and out of Neighborhood Code 4801 prior to 2003. Some of the parcels moved out of Neighborhood 4801 in 2003 were then reassessed in another "neighborhood" for that year. This report will show why there are now some people in Neighborhood Code 4817 (Starter Homes) that shouldn't be there due to location and/or size.

If you would like to view an Adobe pdf copy of my spreadsheets, please click here for report 1 and click here for report 2.

If you have a copy of Excel and would like the actual spreadsheets so you can sort the information yourself, please click here for report 1 and click here for report 2.

Here are some facts about Neighborhood Code 4801 and the 2003 reassessment:

• 1,273 homes were in Neighborhood Code 4801 in 2001 and in 2003 1,289 homes were in Neighborhood Code 4801--an increase of 16 parcels.  Then in 2003, the year that Neighborhood 4801 was reassessed there were only 624 homes. The difference between 2001 and 2002 is because several homes on Stanhope and Fawncrest were moved from Neighborhood 4809 (Newer Subdivision) into Neighborhood 4801 (the Village of New Hartford) in 2002. Why, I don't know--it is very clear that they are not part of the Village of New Hartford, but in 2002, Neighborhood code 4809 (Newer Subdivisions) was reassessed, maybe that had something to do with it.  In case you don't know where Fawncrest and Stanhope is--it would be off Clinton Road past Sycamore Drive.  So I guess that someone realized in 2003, that Stanhope and Fawncrest couldn't possibly be in the Village of New Hartford even though their tax map numbers are similar to the Village, so they moved them out to Neighborhood 4807 (Older Subdivisions.)  They also moved 641 other parcels to Neighborhood Code 4817 (Starter Homes) with no regard to their size, location, etc.  See Report 2.

  In total, 665 homes were moved out of Neighborhood Code 4801 (the Village of New Hartford) in 2003--that is more than 1/2 of the parcels that started out as a Neighborhood Code 4801 in 2001.  These parcels were in the Village "Neighborhood Code" only because they used tax map numbers in 2001 without looking to see if the parcels were actually in the right neighborhoods.  If nothing else bothers anyone, this certainly should. 

   

• Of the 624 homes left in Neighborhood Code 4801 (Village of New Hartford), 19 (or 3%) were decreased probably due to Grievance; 151 (or 24%) saw no increase; and 454 (or 73%) were increased.

 

• By 2003, 24 homes were moved out of Neighborhood 4801 (Village of New Hartford) into Neighborhood 4807 (Older Subdivision).  These would be the same 24 homes moved into Neighborhood 4801 (Village of New Hartford) from Neighborhood Code 4809 (Newer Subdivision) in 2002.  These include parcels on Fawncrest and Stanhope.   Why did these parcels moved from Neighborhood 4809 to 4801 to 4807 is a mystery.  Aren't "like" homes supposed to be grouped together--why the indecision?  By the way, all these homes have similar tax map numbers starting with 328.015-5.

  All but 5 of the 24 homes were reassessed in Neighborhood 4807 (Older Subdivision) in 2003.  Unfortunately, some of the other homes on Fawncrest were reassessed in 2002 because they were in Neighborhood Code 4809 in 2002.  Stanhope was not reassessed until it was moved into Neighborhood Code 4807 in 2003.  Why 5 of the 24 homes were not reassessed when they were moved to Neighborhood 4807 is a question for the Assessor.

If Neighborhood Code 4801 was truly supposed to be the  Village of New Hartford, that should have been pretty easy to do.  Each Village and the Town of New Hartford have their own SWIS code.  The town is 304889 and the Village is 304801.  You will see this number noted on your tax bills and it is clearly identified on each parcel in the assessment database.  However, it is very clear after doing all these reports that homes were grouped by tax map number and nothing else--not location, size of home, style of home or age--was taken into account when neighborhood codes were applied to parcels in the Town of New Hartford.  In subsequent years, homes were moved around in an effort to "fix" the problems, but it only created more problems.

Look at Report 2 and you will see that other than Stanhope and Fawncrest (the first group of homes on the spreadsheet), all the other parcels (the second group of homes on the spreadsheet) were moved from Neighborhood Code 4801 (Village of New Hartford) into Neighborhood Code 4817 (Starter Homes) in 2003.  The sq. ft. of those homes is from 624 to 5,066 and some of the streets are Hawthorne, Sherrillbrook Road, and Gilbert.  How could anyone think these homes belong in "Starter Homes".  They were just moved to get them out of Neighborhood 4801 where they didn't belong.  You would think that once they realized the error of placing them in the Village when they clearly were not Village properties, they would carefully put them in the correct neighborhood in an effort to correct the problem.  Unfortunately, in 2004 the assessor decided to only trend and so these homes were trended 7.5% and never have been reassessed.  Clearly some of the parcels moved in "Starter Homes" should have been moved there, actually they should have been there from the beginning, but some of them should have been included in Neighborhood Code 4809 and/or 4815 and reassessed then trended 10-15% in 2004.   And if the neighborhood codes had been done right in the beginning, they wouldn't have had to move anything.   Is it fair to move certain homes in and out of neighborhoods?  Is that your idea of fair and equitable assessing?

Look at the report for any homes in your area or homes that you are familiar with before you decide what these reports are showing. We certainly are not able to physically look at all the properties that weren't increased.  These reports are provided for your information only.  Sales for each property are now included in the Assessment Program and would be helpful in determining if a property has increased in value.

If you think that because you are not in Neighborhood Code 4801, 4807 or 4809, 4813 this doesn't affect you, think again.  It impacts everyone! 

If these reports bother you, we urge you to call your councilman.  Unless we let them know how we feel, they will continue to deny there is a problem.  They seem to be good at doing just that!

The International Association of Assessing Officers (IAAO) defines a neighborhood as "(1) The environment of a subject property that has a direct and immediate effect on value.  (2)  A geographic area of properties sharing important location characteristics defined for purposes of market analysis or modeling (typically with fewer than several thousand properties)."  Notice both of these definitions revolve around the notion of effect of location on value.

In simpler terms, a "neighborhood" consists of properties that are comparable in terms of the probability of a buyer being equally as interested in buying House A as they would be in buying House B.  In other words, if I was a buyer, I would not be interested in looking at a house in a neighborhood code made up with homes that are 1,000 sq. ft. when I intend to buy a 5,000 sq. ft. home. Therefore, the 1,000 sq. ft. home should not be in the same neighborhood code as the 5,000 sq. ft. home.