Assessments: A Growing Problem?

The report below was given and explained to the Town Board of New Hartford, N.Y. in August 2004, given to the Town Assessor in the Spring of 2005 and in March 2006 it was given and explained to the two Town Councilmen who are currently on the Assessment Committee. Please refer to Neighborhood Codes for a description of each Code on the report below.

Neigh Code	High Assmt	Low Assmt	Assessment $ Spread Within each Nbhd	High Sq. Ft.	Low Sq. Ft.	House Sq. Ft. Spread within each Nbhd

4801	$ 260,700	$ 48,400	$ 212,300	4,180	864	3,316

4803	$ 275,000	$ 5,000	$ 270,000	3,394	651	2,743

4805	$ 129,000	$ 25,000	$ 104,000	3,018	774	2,244

4807	$ 522,200	$ 10,600	$ 511,600	5,008	518	4,490

4809	$ 585,000	$ 134,200	$ 450,800	5,156	1,832	3,324

4811	$ 450,000	$ 24,000	$ 426,000	5,728	800	4,928

4813	$ 366,500	$ 52,500	$ 314,000	4,421	980	3,441

4815	$ 918,900	$ 155,300	$ 763,600	7,160	1,828	5,332

4817	$ 247,300	$ 9,100	$ 238,200	5,066	624	4,442

Notice the difference in the high and low assessed value in each neighborhood and then notice the difference in the high and low square footage of the homes in each neighborhood. How can homes be fairly assessed when, as in Neighborhood 4807 (Older Subdivisions) for instance, there is over 1/2 million dollars difference in the assessed value of the homes and almost 4,500 square feet difference in the size of the homes? Remember, neighborhood codes should reflect "like" housing. Look at each of the neighborhoods and ask yourself--how can that be--are we assessing fairly? Do you think a 5,728 sq. ft. home compares to an 800 sq. ft. home? Also, remember that the year(s) a home was reassessed or trended depended on the Neighborhood Code it was in at the time. So if a 5,008 home was in Neighborhood 4807 in 2004, they were only trended 5.5% not 15% like most of the other larger homes.

We have the full reports to back up this information and we will gladly share them with anyone who is interested. Please contact us.

By the way, we did not use Property Class 250 (Mansions) for this report--it would tend to skew the numbers if we did--these are only Property Class 210 - Single Family homes.

Also, since 2004, the Town of New Hartford is no longer taking part in the State's Reassessment Program, the only changes to the assessed values in our Town are as a result of new construction.

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